English LCCC Newsbulletin For Lebanese, Lebanese Related, Global News & Editorials
For May 10/2023
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani
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15 آذار/2023

Bible Quotations For today
If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me
Matthew 16,21-28: “From that time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, ‘God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you.’But he turned and said to Peter, ‘Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling-block to me; for you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things.’Then Jesus told his disciples, ‘If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life? Or what will they give in return for their life? ‘For the Son of Man is to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay everyone for what has been done. Truly I tell you, there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.’””

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on May 09-10/2023
Angry protesters burn ATM at bank in Beirut
UNIFIL’s Tenanti: It is part of our job to ensure that there are no weapons or rockets in our area of operations in coordination with the Lebanese...
Army chief may become 'consensual' president as PSP rules out Franjieh
Report: Paris begins changing its stance on Lebanon presidency
'Breakthroughs' in opposition-FPM talks for agreeing on candidate
Report: Jumblat told Berri he won't endorse Franjieh
Report: Berri won't call for vote soon, rejects Bkirki list of candidates
Bukhari reiterates KSA 'neutrality' as he meets Saniora, Sunni MPs
Elias Bou Saab meets Walid Jumblatt to stress need for dialogue
Bou Saab on presidential initiative: Results within 10 days
Depositors try to storm bank, clash with security forces near parliament
Report: Nasrallah met Assad after Iranian-Saudi agreement
Mikati 'won't keep Salameh in post, won't name replacement'
Mikati receives Iraqi Minister of Labour and Social Affairs in presence of Caretaker Minister Bayram, meets World Bank Country Director, Nejmeh Club...
GS's Baissari broaches developments with Swiss, US Ambassadors
Rahi meets French Ambassador in Bkerki
Derian broaches developments with Japanese, Canadian Ambassadors
Frangieh discusses Syrian displacement crisis with UN’s Riza, broaches developments with Australian Ambassador
Lebanese, Iraqi Labor Ministries agree on new cooperation to protect workers' rights
Total-led consortium to start drilling offshore Lebanon in September
Captagon pills: Uncovering the link between drug smuggling and its dangers in the Arab World
Oil prices edge lower in Lebanon
Hezbollah Is Missing from President Biden’s Corruption Agenda/Emanuele Ottolenghi/he National Interest/May 09/2023

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on May 09-10/2023
Israeli strikes in Gaza kill three Islamic Jihad commanders and family members
Hamas, Islamic Jihad vow response to Israel's Gaza strikes as West Bank erupts
Israel braces for revenge after killing Islamic Jihad commanders in Gaza
Saudi Arabia resumes work of its diplomatic mission in Syria
UN chief hopes Syria's return to Arab League helps end war
Analysis-Arabs bring Syria's Assad back into fold but want action on drugs trade
Russian troops are deserting in Bakhmut, Wagner chief complains
EU takes aim at countries helping Russia to avoid sanctions
Ukraine says it offered to return 3,000 dead Russian soldiers for burial, but Russia
Ukraine flags block Russian ambassador's path on Victory Day
Russia targets Kyiv on Victory Day, parade pared back amid shortages at the front
UK leads charge for Ukraine to get missiles with 200-mile range
FBI says it has sabotaged hacking tool created by elite Russian spies
Canadian diplomat expelled from China in retaliation for similar move by Ottawa
Sudan’s death toll rises as warring sides continue talks
Turkish, Syrian foreign ministers to meet in Moscow

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on May 09-10/2023
Turkey's Hizbullah Terrorists: Erdoğan's New Ally/Burak Bekdil/Gatestone Institute./May 09/2023
Civil wars are getting longer and more difficult to resolve/Kerry Boyd Anderson/Arab News/09 May/2023
US politics is being played out on Israeli turf/Yossi Mekelberg/Arab News/09 May/2023
Khader Adnan, the most unifying figure in Palestine/Ramzy Baroud/Arab News/09 May/2023
Arab League’s approach to Syria the only one that makes sense/Osama Al-Sharif/Arab News/09 May/2023

Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on May 09-10/2023
Angry protesters burn ATM at bank in Beirut
Arab News/May 09, 2023
BEIRUT: Protesters smashed and burned an ATM at a bank in Beirut on Tuesday as depositors again took to the streets to protest against Lebanese banking restrictions that have denied them full access to their foreign currency savings since 2019. At the same time bank customers have been unable to withdraw their savings, the value of the country’s own currency has collapsed amid an ongoing economic crisis and political paralysis that has pushed many people into poverty. Dozens of members of the Depositors’ Cry group gathered near the Lebanese Parliament in Beirut, blocked the road and targeted a nearby branch of Bank Audi, smashing and burning its ATM. Some also tried to storm the bank, throwing stones and firecrackers at the entrance. Riot police intervened and some protesters were injured. The demonstrators, who included lawyers, retired military personnel, union activists and teachers, carried banners demanding the right to access their savings, and calling on authorities to take action to recover the billions of dollars believed to have been smuggled abroad, and hold accountable those responsible for doing so. The protest on Tuesday was the latest in a long line of similar demonstrations, the most recent of which was in February when protesters burned the facades of four banks in Beirut. The Association of Banks in Lebanon had hinted that bank workers would resume a strike should branches or ATMs be attacked. Some protesters headed toward association’s headquarters in Beirut, others gathered near the residence of caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati. Depositors who are do manage to withdraw some of their dollar deposits are paid in the national currency at the official exchange rate of 15,000 Lebanese pounds to the dollar. However, the readily available exchange rate on the black market has reached 100,000 Lebanese pounds to the dollar. Richard Pharaoh, the secretary of the Depositors’ Cry group, said: “We spoke to several officials but no one cared or took any action, so we had to escalate.
“Depositors face dire conditions as a result of the economic crisis and they are unable to recover. They cannot even buy medicine because the banks are withholding their money.”Investigations by Lebanese and European judiciaries are continuing into alleged violations by some banks accused of smuggling money abroad despite an official order to freeze such transfers. Mount Lebanon Public Prosecutor Judge Ghada Aoun, who appealed a decision to dismiss her from the Lebanese judiciary on Monday, has been investigating a number of banks for money laundering, illegal enrichment, abuse of trust, and violation of banking codes. Aoun was due on Tuesday to question the chairman of the board of directors of Bank of Beirut, Samir Sfeir; the general manager of BLOM Bank, Saad Azhari; the chairman of the board of directors of the Societe Generale Bank, Antoun Sehnaoui; and the chairman of the board of directors of Bank Audi, Samir Hanna. Lawyers representing some of the bankers appeared before Aoun, while others asked for more time to submit documents and written evidence. Meanwhile, European authorities are investigating Riad Salameh, the governor of Lebanon’s central bank, Banque du Liban, his brother, Raja Salameh, and his assistant, Marianne Hoayek. The French judiciary is expected to question Riad Salameh in Paris on May 16 but a judicial source said the governor is yet to be officially notified of a date. The Lebanese government is looking at ways to fill an imminent power vacuum at the central bank, as Salameh’s 30-year reign is due to end soon. He said in February he intends to step down when his fifth term ends this year. However, there are difficulties in appointing a new governor given that a caretaker government with limited powers remains in charge of the country, and the office of president has been empty since Michel Aoun’s term ended in October last year. Should one of Salameh’s deputies take charge, the government risks angering Lebanese Christians because the position is traditionally reserved for a Maronite and Salameh’s first deputy is Shiite and his second deputy Sunni. Mikati said on Monday that he would not agree to extend Salameh’s term as governor even if no successor can be nominated. “The law protects the central bank in the event that the governor’s position becomes vacant, as the first deputy assumes his powers directly without the need for any decision from the government and no other (central bank) employee can assume this task in place of the first deputy,” he said.

UNIFIL’s Tenanti: It is part of our job to ensure that there are no weapons or rockets in our area of operations in coordination with the Lebanese...
NNA/May 09/2023
In response to a question on the situation in southern and UNIFIL’s activities, UNIFIL Spokesperson Andrea Tenenti said that “UNIFIL’s mandate is to prevent hostile activities and to preserve stability in southern Lebanon.”
“It is part of our job to ensure that there are no weapons or rockets in our area of operations, and that is done in coordination with the Lebanese Armed Force (LAF),” he noted. “In addition, we do have counter rocket operations, together with patrolling our area of operations, and these are regular activities. We are implementing our mandate and these activities are part of this implementation,” the UNIFIL Spokesperson concluded.

Army chief may become 'consensual' president as PSP rules out Franjieh
Naharnet/May 09/2023
Behind-the-scenes contacts have not stopped in a bid to achieve a certain breakthrough in the presidential file and Speaker Nabih Berri is expected to call for a presidential vote session in late May or in early June, a media report said.
“Some international and regional indications signal the possibility of resolving the presidential void crisis and the figure on whom there will be consensus is not necessarily among the names that are being currently circulated,” informed political sources told the PSP’s al-Anbaa news portal in remarks published Tuesday. “The chances of Army Commander General Joseph Aoun are still high and the possibility of agreeing on him as a consensual candidate is not ruled out,” the sources added. MP Faisal al-Sayegh of the PSP also expected a “certain breakthrough,” telling al-Anbaa that “there are serious contacts and international and regional pressure that is expected to further accelerate in the second half of this month.” Sayegh however ruled out the possibility of consensus on Suleiman Franjieh’s nomination, noting that “so far he has failed to promote himself as not being a confrontation candidate.”
“That’s why the opposition blocs will not accept him,” Sayegh added.

Report: Paris begins changing its stance on Lebanon presidency
Naharnet/May 09/2023
There is a “beginning of a transformation” in Paris’ stance on the Lebanese presidential file, specifically as to its call for electing Suleiman Franjieh as president in return for naming Nawaf Salam as premier, several highly-informed French sources have said. “Paris has reached a conclusion that its plan does not enjoy the circumstances of success,” the sources told the Saudi-owned Asharq al-Awsat newspaper in remarks published Tuesday. “A meeting for the five-party group (France, U.S., KSA, Egypt and Qatar) had been scheduled for the current month, but the differences within the group led to postponing it to next month without specifying an exact date,” the daily added.Franjieh has so far failed to win the support of any of the country’s leading Christian parties – the Free Patriotic Movement, the Lebanese Forces and the Kataeb Party. He is also facing opposition from the Progressive Socialist Party and the Change bloc.

'Breakthroughs' in opposition-FPM talks for agreeing on candidate
Naharnet/May 09/2023
International and regional pressure for ending Lebanon’s presidential void has pushed political forces, including the Lebanese Forces and the Free Patriotic Movement, to intensify communication in a bid to reach consensus over a presidential candidate, a media report and an LF MP said. “The contacts have led to breakthroughs but have not yet reached the stage of consensus over a single candidate,” Asharq al-Awsat newspaper, which is close to the Saudi leadership, reported on Tuesday. “There is communication among all opposition parties and between the opposition and the FPM,” MP Fadi Karam of the LF told the daily. “There are chances for rapprochement and bridging the gaps between us,” Karam added. “Due to the meetings and negotiations with the opposition and the FPM, things have become clearer and are no longer vague concerning a candidate who can be nominated in a joint manner,” the lawmaker went on to say. As for FPM chief Jebran Bassil’s rejection of the nomination of Army chief Gen. Joseph Aoun, Karam said: “Nothing is final regarding the names, even the name of the army commander.”

Report: Jumblat told Berri he won't endorse Franjieh
Naharnet/May 09/2023
Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblat has told Speaker Nabih Berri that he will not endorse Suleiman Franjieh, informed sources told al-Akhbar. The sources said, in remarks published Tuesday, that Jumblat cannot endorse a settlement without the approval of one of the two largest Christian blocs, in order to maintain the Christian-Druze ties in Mount Lebanon. The sources went on to say that the Saudi disinterest in the Lebanese file further confused Jumblat and did not reassure him. PSP MP Faisal al-Sayegh also told al-Anbaa news portal that the possibility of consensus on Franjieh is unlikely, as the opposition blocs will not accept a non-confrontational candidate.

Report: Berri won't call for vote soon, rejects Bkirki list of candidates
Naharnet/May 09/2023
The atmosphere of the presidential deliberations does not indicate that Speaker Nabih Berri will call for a presidential election session in the near future and “the Lebanese will likely bid farewell to the month of May without seeing a president in the Baabda Palace,” a media report said. “Berri has received from Bkirki a list containing a host of (presidential) candidates in order to pick three of them so that the Maronite church can promote them with the other parliamentary blocs ahead of taking the names to parliament,” Annahar newspaper reported. But Berri rejected the list, noting that his candidate is Suleiman Franjieh and that Washington and Riyadh have not vetoed his nomination, the daily added.

Bukhari reiterates KSA 'neutrality' as he meets Saniora, Sunni MPs
Naharnet/May 09/2023
Saudi ambassador Walid Bukhari met Tuesday with MPs of the majority-Sunni National Moderation bloc. "Bukhari has stressed the neutral position of Saudi Arabia, and the need to expedite the presidential election,” the bloc said in a statement.
Bukhari later met with former Prime Minister Fouad Saniora and said after the meeting that the Kingdom is confident of the Lebanese people's will "to change towards a better tomorrow." Bukhari had met with Lebanese leaders in the past few days over the presidential crisis. He met this week with caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati who will attend on May 19 an Arab League's summit in Jeddah. Last week, Bukhari had met with Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi, Speaker Nabih Berri, Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea, and Kataeb Party leader Sami Gemayel. On Saturday he met with Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblat, who said that the kingdom does not have a presidential candidate or a veto on any candidate.

Elias Bou Saab meets Walid Jumblatt to stress need for dialogue
LBCI/May 09/2023
The Lebanese Deputy Speaker of the Parliament, Elias Bou Saab, visited the head of the Progressive Socialist Party, Walid Jumblatt, in Clemenceau, in the presence of MP Hadi Abu Al-Hassan, who confirmed, after the meeting, that "there is no alternative to dialogue, and it is not permissible to waste time." He said, "We face major challenges, as the country is sinking and disintegrating, and we have to go with a realistic agenda and agree on a president for the republic." He added, "There is a group that feels challenged, and what is required is that we take a step back to meet and get out of the intractable crisis." In turn, Bou Saab said: "We agreed on the need to organize the next stage and work to gather common denominators and build bridges."

Bou Saab on presidential initiative: Results within 10 days
Naharnet/May 09/2023
Deputy Speaker Elias Bou Saab met Tuesday with Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri in Ain el-Tineh, as he ends an "exploratory tour" he had initiated to discuss the presidential crisis with Lebanese leaders. Bou Saab said he took the initiative, after parties refused dialogue, and that the first stage of his initiative ends today, and evaluation will follow. "the aim is to break the impasse," he elaborated, stressing on the importance of domestic communication. Also on Tuesday, Bou Saab met with Democratic Gathering bloc chief Taymour Jumblat in Clemenceau. "The first step of the initiative has been agreed upon and accepted by everyone, and we must see a result within 10 days," Bou Saab said. The Deputy Speaker had met with Hezbollah MP Mohammed Raad, Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea, Kataeb leader Sami Gmayel, Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi, and Tajaddod MPs Michel Mouawad and Fouad Makhzoumi.

Depositors try to storm bank, clash with security forces near parliament
Naharnet/May 09/2023
The Depositors Outcry association on Tuesday staged a sit-in outside parliament in protest at the state’s financial policies and to demand the recovery of deposits. The protesters blocked the road near parliament amid the deployment of army troops and security forces. Clashes later ensued, leaving several protesters injured. Depositors also hurled firecrackers outside caretaker PM Najib Mikati's residence which is also located in downtown Beirut. They also attempted to cut off the barbed wire outside the building amid strict security measures. Nearby, other depositors tried to storm Bank Audi’s Bab Idriss branch. They also smashed its ATM and burned tires. Lebanon's financial meltdown erupted in 2019, following decades of rampant corruption and mismanagement by the country's political and financial elite. Three-quarters of Lebanon's population of over 6 million now lives in poverty and inflation is soaring. In late 2019, Lebanese banks imposed informal capital controls, restricting cash withdrawals from accounts to avoid folding amid currency shortages. People with dollar accounts could only withdraw small sums in Lebanese pounds, at an exchange rate far lower than that of the black market. This effectively evaporated the savings of many across the country. Angry depositors resorted to armed bank heists and protests, demanding their own money. Others have filed lawsuits from abroad to retrieve their money in hard currency.

Report: Nasrallah met Assad after Iranian-Saudi agreement
Naharnet/May 09/2023
Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah visited Syria and met with its president Bashar al-Assad after the Iranian-Saudi reconciliation agreement was signed, a media report said. “The discussion points included all of the regional files, from the situation in Israel and its latest developments to the situation in Syria to the presidency in Lebanon,” the Nidaa al-Watan newspaper reported on Tuesday. Describing the meeting as “good,” sources informed on the meeting told the daily that the talks tackled Suleiman Franjieh’s nomination and that the Syrian stance was “identical to Iran’s stance in terms of leaving the issue to the ally Hezbollah.” Damascus “will employ all capabilities for his election but it does not and has not directly interfered until the moment,” the sources added.

Mikati 'won't keep Salameh in post, won't name replacement'
Naharnet/May 09/2023
Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati has asked ministers about what can be done in the Syrian refugee file and the looming vacuum in the central bank governor post in light of the ongoing presidential void, a media report said. Mikati raised the question in Monday’s consultative ministerial meeting at the Grand Serail, which was attended by all of the government’s components including the Free Patriotic Movement. “What should we do if the time for the departure of Central Bank Governor Riad Salameh from his post nears? I stress that he will not stay in his post at all and that I will not name anyone to replace him,” Mikati told the ministers, according to the Nidaa al-Watan newspaper. Salameh is the target of a series of judicial investigations in Lebanon and abroad on suspicion of embezzlement and money laundering, among other allegations, with investigators looking into the fortune he has amassed during three decades in the job. France, Germany and Luxembourg seized assets worth 120 million euros ($130 million) in March 2022 in a move linked to a French probe into Salameh's personal wealth. Lebanese authorities have charged Salameh with embezzlement, money laundering and tax evasion as part of their own investigation. The domestic probe was opened following a request for assistance from Switzerland's public prosecutor looking into more than $300 million in fund movements by the Salameh brothers. Salameh, whose mandate is due to end in July, is part of the Lebanese political class widely blamed for a crushing economic crisis that began in late 2019 and which the World Bank has dubbed one of the worst in recent history. European investigators questioned Salameh, who denies wrongdoing, in Beirut last month. He has been summoned for a hearing in France on May 16.

Mikati receives Iraqi Minister of Labour and Social Affairs in presence of Caretaker Minister Bayram, meets World Bank Country Director, Nejmeh Club...
NNA/May 09/2023
Caretaker Prime Minister, Najib Mikati, on Tuesday welcomed at the Grand Serail, Iraqi Minister of Labour and Social Affairs, Ahmad Al-Asadi, with an accompanying delegation, in the presence of Caretaker Minister of Labor, Mostafa Bayram, and the Chargé d'Affaires of the Iraqi Embassy in Lebanon, Amin Abdullah al-Nasrawi. On emerging, Caretaker Minister Bayram said that the visiting Iraqi Minister informed the Premier of Iraq's position in support of Lebanon. Minister Bayram added: “Today, we are in the process of signing a memorandum of understanding at the Ministry of Labor aimed to protect employment in the two countries and strengthen the status of workers of both countries, in a way that benefits the two brotherly peoples.”For his part, Minister Al-Asadi relayed the Iraqi government and people's wishes for Lebanon to overcome its current crisis, emphasizing the Iraqi government’s continued support for Lebanon. “We are committed to continuing support for Lebanon,” Al-Asadi stressed. On the other hand, Premier Mikati met at the Grand Serail with the World Bank Country Director for the Middle East Department, Jean-Christophe Carret, in the presence of Deputy Prime Minister, Saade Al-Shami. During the meeting, they discussed the World Bank's projects for Lebanon. Mikati later met with Acting Director General of General Security, Brigadier General Elias Baissari. The PM also received Al-Nejmeh Club President, Mazen Al-Zaani, who visited him with an accompanying delegation from the Club.

GS's Baissari broaches developments with Swiss, US Ambassadors
NNA/May 09/2023
Acting Director General of General Security, Brigadier General Elias Baissari, on Tuesday received in his office, Swiss Ambassador to Lebanon, Marion Weichett. Discussions during the meeting focused on the general situation and ways to enhance cooperation between the Embassy and the General Security. Brigadier General Elias Baissari also met with US Ambassador to Lebanon, Dorothy Shea, over the latest developments on the domestic arena.

Rahi meets French Ambassador in Bkerki
NNA/May 09/2023
Maronite Patriarch, Cardinal Mar Beshara Boutros Al-Rahi, on Tuesday met in Bkerki with French Ambassador to Lebanon, Anne Grillo. Talks between the pair reportedly focused on the most recent developments on the local and regional scenes.

Derian broaches developments with Japanese, Canadian Ambassadors
NNA/May 09/2023
Grand Mufti of the Lebanese Republic, Sheikh Abdel Latif Derian, on Tuesday welcomed at his Dar al-Fatwa residence Japanese Ambassador to Lebanon, Masayuki Magoshi, with whom he discussed the situation in Lebanon and the region, as well as the best means to bolster cooperation between the two countries. Derain also received Canadian Ambassador to Lebanon, Stephanie McCollum, with who he broached general affairs, and the means to strengthen relations between both countries.

Frangieh discusses Syrian displacement crisis with UN’s Riza, broaches developments with Australian Ambassador
NNA/May 09/2023
Marada Movement Leader, Sleiman Frangieh, received, at his Bnachei residence on Tuesday, UN Deputy Special Coordinator for Lebanon, Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator, Imran Riza, in the presence of Dr. John Boutros. Discussions reportedly focused on the latest developments and the current situation in the country, especially the Syrian displacement crisis. Frangieh later met with Australian Ambassador to Lebanon, Andrew Barnes, over the latest developments in Lebanon and the region, and the bilateral relations between the two countries.

Lebanese, Iraqi Labor Ministries agree on new cooperation to protect workers' rights
LBCI/May 09/2023
The Caretaker Minister of Labor, Moustafa Bayram, and his Iraqi counterpart, Ahmad Al-Asadi, signed a memorandum of understanding related to work and vocational training. After signing the memorandum, the two ministers held a joint press conference. Minister Bayram started by saying that the signing of the cooperation memorandum was the first between the Lebanese and Iraqi Labor Ministries. He noted that the importance of this memorandum is that it regulates employment between the two countries and preserves their rights. Minister Bayram explained, "The follow-up mechanism will be according to a committee formed based on this memorandum, considering that this makes the workers feel important and that their rights are preserved, calling on all violating workers in Lebanon and Iraq to expedite a settlement of their situation, because that would give them rights and their salary becomes higher and better." Minister Bayram affirmed, "The Iraqi Minister of Labor achieved reciprocity for the Iraqi worker," noting that the Lebanese in Iraq were benefiting from social security, while the Iraqi was paying for social security in Lebanon, but he was not benefiting from the security services, and that has been amended.  As for the file of accelerated vocational training and the file of exchanging employment needs, Minister Bayram indicated that there would be an exchange of information about jobs that the Iraqis or Lebanese may need, which would benefit the two "brotherly" parties. In turn, Minister Al-Asadi indicated that the signing of this memorandum is a continuation of past contracts between the two countries, considering that this memorandum confirms the strong and good relationship between the two countries. He explained that the memorandum of understanding deals with accelerated and refined vocational training and everything related to employment. Minister Al-Asadi affirmed that when he visits Lebanon, he feels proud "as it is a country that represents challenge, steadfastness, and resistance," stressing that "Lebanon, despite its crises, was and will remain a country of giving." The Iraqi Minister of Labor reaffirmed that "Iraq, with its government and people, stands by Lebanon in its crises," hoping that "Lebanon will return to what it was before and enjoy stability and prosperity." "The agreement will be directly implemented, especially concerning vocational training," Minister al-Asadi said, noting that "direct cooperation will begin with the Ministries of Labor and Social Affairs," pointing out that "the number of Lebanese workers in Iraq is approximately 17,000."  About the jobs available to workers, Minister Bayram explained, "Every country works a kind of protection for workers in its country, that is, when an Iraqi worker accepts a certain type of job, it is the duty of the Iraqi government to protect these professions and limit them to Iraqis, and the same thing is in Lebanon."

Total-led consortium to start drilling offshore Lebanon in September
LBCI/May 09/2023
A consortium led by TotalEnergies (TTEF.PA) will start drilling for oil and gas off the coast of Lebanon at the beginning of September, the country's caretaker energy minister Walid Fayyad said on Tuesday. The consortium, which includes Italy's partners ENI (ENI.MI) and QatarEnergy [RIC:RIC:QATPE.UL], has assigned a rig for the offshore southern bloc known as Bloc 9. "The rig will start working in Lebanon in September ... before the end of the year we will know if there is a discovery," Fayyad told reporters on the sidelines of the World Utilities Congress in Abu Dhabi. Lebanon formally delineated its maritime border with Israel in October after years of US-mediated talks. The minister said he was hopeful that if a discovery was made, it would unlock more investments in Lebanon's offshore oil and gas sector. Fayyad said a potential discovery could impact whether a deadline for applications to explore in eight additional offshore blocs is extended yet again, past June.

Captagon pills: Uncovering the link between drug smuggling and its dangers in the Arab World
LBCI/May 09/2023
On Sunday night, Jordanian authorities successfully targeted the most prominent drug smuggler in Syria, specifically for the drug known as Captagon. So, what is Captagon, and why is it so popular in the Arab world? Captagon, also known as "poor man's cocaine," is common among war militias and youth in Arab countries. Militias use it to stay awake for extended periods, while the youth use it to help them concentrate on studying and for entertainment during parties.However, the dangers of Captagon are significant, as it can cause severe physical, mental, and psychological damage, such as depression, tremors, and other symptoms that could lead to heart disease and brain cell death. Like any drug, there are various types of Captagon, depending on the target market. The white pill is of the highest quality and is exported to Gulf countries. The yellow pill, known as "capti," is prevalent in Syria and Lebanon, and it reduces appetite and helps with concentration. The pink or strawberry pill is marketed as an aphrodisiac that provides energy and confidence. The manufacturing cost of one pill is less than a dollar, while its price ranges from one to seven dollars in Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq. In Gulf countries, it can cost up to $25 due to transportation costs and the fact that it is considered the cleanest version for the consumer. Imagine the profit margins of this industry, where the cost of manufacturing is just a few cents and tens of dollars for the sale price, with millions of pills sold annually.

Oil prices edge lower in Lebanon
NNA/May 09/2023
Oil prices in Lebanon have dropped on Tuesday. Consequently, the new prices are as follows:
95 octanes: LBP 1,659,000
98 octanes: LBP 1,701,000
Diesel: LBP 1,421,000
Gas: LBP 954,000

Hezbollah Is Missing from President Biden’s Corruption Agenda
Emanuele Ottolenghi/he National Interest/May 09/2023
حزب الله غائب عن أجندة الفساد للرئيس بايدن
إيمانويل أوتولينغي/ناشيونال انتررست/09 آيار/2023 (ترجمة غوغل)
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/archives/118063/118063/
Making global corruption a national security priority is the right decision. Recognizing Hezbollah’s systematic reliance on corruption to facilitate its illicit finance networks would make the White House strategy more effective.
In June 2021, President Joe Biden made fighting global corruption an official priority, directing the National Security Council to conduct an interagency review and promulgate an all-of-government anti-corruption strategy. In December of that year, the Biden White House published its Strategy on Countering Global Corruption, and for the first time in history, fighting global corruption became a “core United States national security interest.” This is commendable, but it would be more effective if the fight against global corruption also highlighted—and targeted—the symbiotic relationship between organized crime, terror finance, and corruption.
The president already has, by virtue of legislation and executive orders enacted by his predecessors, a panoply of tools to go after transnational organized crime and terror finance networks. And the Biden White House also expanded its toolkit in 2021, appointing a State Department coordinator to fight global corruption, establishing the U.S. Council on Transnational Crime, and issuing an executive order to impose sanctions on foreign persons involved in the global illicit drug trade. Yet what’s missing is an integrated approach based on an understanding of how these threats intersect, which targets them simultaneously. It is not enough to prioritize corruption. The Biden anti-corruption strategy must go after both bribers and bribed. Hezbollah is a perfect candidate.
On April 18, 2023, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) indicted Nazem Said Ahmad and eight associates for their alleged role in a fraudulent transaction involving artwork, luxury goods, and precious stones, many of them purchased in the United States. Contemporaneously, the Treasury Department sanctioned Ahmad’s international network, expanding its 2019 designation against him and his companies. Ahmad, Treasury asserts, is a Hezbollah financier and an associate of Hezbollah financier Mohammad Bazzi, whom Treasury designated in 2018. (Romanian authorities arrested Bazzi in Bucharest last February, and he is awaiting extradition to the United States.)
These actions, as well as past DOJ and Treasury actions, show Hezbollah’s global reach as a terrorist organization funded through criminal activities by its members, associates, and sympathizers. Less evident, though no less important, is something else these cases all have in common: corruption. The Ahmad network, the Treasury designation states, leveraged “Hizballah’s influence at … ports of entry to move assets into Lebanon without paying the applicable taxes and duties”—a likely reference to immigration, security, and customs officials in Hezbollah’s payroll. Bazzi, for his part, leveraged his connection with Yahya Jammeh, then dictator of Gambia, buttressing local corruption in exchange for the ability to run illicit businesses that ultimately financed Hezbollah.
Outside of Lebanon, Hezbollah buys impunity from local scrutiny and prosecution for its illicit networks through bribery and corruption at the highest levels of government and local public administration. In Lebanon, it uses its influence and political power to buy impunity—through bribes—for those running illicit businesses. Such extensive corruption contributes to the erosion of good governance, weakens democratic institutions, undermines the rule of law, and empowers corrupt officials and politicians.
Corruption, then, is a critical tool in Hezbollah’s strategy to self-fund through illicit activities, which has been underscored by previous Treasury designations against Hezbollah operations in the Gambia, Guinea, and Paraguay. Since it is also a top foreign policy priority for the Biden White House, the president should recognize that corruption is an integral element of Hezbollah’s modus operandi, and target, through designations, both sides of the corruption equation. Why not, for example, sanction the corrupt Lebanese officials who facilitated the recently sanctioned Ahmad network’s operations?
Terror organizations like Hezbollah self-finance by engaging in extensive transnational criminal activities, often in close cooperation with international criminal syndicates. The crime-terror finance nexus is nothing new. Across the span of history and geography, terrorism has been self-financed, at least in part, through criminal activities. The Bolsheviks in tsarist Russia funded their subversive activities through crime—which catapulted a young Joseph Stalin to center stage in the party machine. More recently, Ireland’s Irish Republican Army, the Italian Red Brigades, the Basque ETA, Colombia’s FARC, the Taliban, Al Qaeda, and the Islamic State all engaged in criminal activities to fundraise—including the illicit drug trade, human trafficking and organ harvesting, and trafficking in antiquities. Hezbollah continues to be involved in a multiplicity of criminal activities, including, critically, money laundering on behalf of international criminal syndicates. The Trump administration designated Hezbollah as a transnational criminal organization for its involvement in global criminal activities.
Trafficking and laundering depend on the ability of terror groups to establish working relations with crime syndicates, which can evolve into symbiotic partnerships. Criminals and terror financiers depend on one another for the supply of illicit merchandise and the transport, distribution, and laundering of the proceeds from sales.
Critically, both rely, for the success of their criminal endeavors, on their ability to infiltrate state institutions at all levels—police, customs, border guards, port workers, the judiciary, and elected officials—and to put these people on their payroll to protect their commercial enterprise.
Hezbollah is no exception. As Marshall Billingslea, then assistant secretary for Treasury’s Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, said in a speech at the Atlantic Council in September 2019, “Hizballah supplements its income by using businessmen to operate a wide range of companies, using political relationships to gain favored contracts and even monopolies in prominent sectors … Hizballah also benefits from various international criminal schemes, including money laundering, drug trafficking and counterfeiting, operated by its supporters, sympathizers, and members.”
Examples abound of Hezbollah’s systematic reliance on corruption to grease the wheels of its complex criminal enterprises. Take Paraguay, one of the most corrupt countries in Latin America, ranked 137 out of 180 in the Transparency International 2022 corruption index, whose systemic corruption makes it a gangster’s paradise. While historically a hub for smuggling, in recent years, Paraguay has been turned by international crime syndicates into a key transit point for narcotrafficking. The U.S. Department of State’s 2022 annual International Narcotics Control Strategy Report (Volume II) noted that crime syndicates in Paraguay, especially in the tri-border area it shares with Brazil and Argentina, often rely on “the assistance of co-opted government officials” for their trafficking. The corruption of politicians and public officials has deep roots in the local political culture, and criminals, including Hezbollah, exploit this.
Last January, the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned Paraguay’s past president, Horacio Cartes, and its current vice president, Hugo Velazquez, “for their involvement in the rampant corruption that undermines democratic institutions in Paraguay.” (Cartes’s attorney dismissed the allegations as politically tainted; Velazquez announced, through his attorney, that he will challenge them in a U.S. court.) But according to Treasury, both politicians have ties with members of Hezbollah, which, Treasury explained, “has regularly held private events in Paraguay where politicians make agreements for favors, sell state contracts, and discuss law enforcement efforts in exchange for bribes. Representatives of both Cartes and Velazquez have collected bribes at these meetings.” If confirmed, this situation—in which Hezbollah representatives buy off Paraguayan politicians in exchange for favors, state contracts, and information on law enforcement efforts, presumably against their interest—calls for U.S. sanctions not only against those Paraguayan officials who were bribed, but also the Hezbollah emissaries who put money in their pockets.
This is not the first time the United States has tied Hezbollah’s illicit finance to corruption in Paraguay. In 2021, Treasury sanctioned Kassem Mohamad Hijazi, a Lebanese-Brazilian dual national who was subsequently extradited to the United States and indicted, for buying off law enforcement officials in order to guarantee protection for a trade-based money laundering network.
Although sanctioned for corruption and indicted on money laundering charges, Hijazi is, according to leaked classified State Department cables from 2005, a Hezbollah fundraiser and supporter. Paraguayan media have reported that Hijazi, to derail the extradition proceedings, allegedly paid a bribe to a family member of a Paraguayan Supreme Court judge, who has denied any involvement. This, then, is a case where U.S. authorities targeted an alleged Hezbollah briber, but not the beneficiaries of his bribes.
As goes Paraguay, so go other countries with high rates of corruption. Guinea, in West Africa, ranks even worse than Paraguay in the annual Transparency International Corruption Index. Unsurprisingly, Hezbollah has exploited political connections in that country to facilitate illicit activities. In 2022, Treasury sanctioned two Guinean-Lebanese dual nationals, accusing them of buying off airport authorities to facilitate the transit of suitcases filled with cash, destined for Hezbollah in Lebanon. The two, well-established businessmen in that country, were charged, according to Treasury, with collecting financial support for Hezbollah and transferring the funds to Lebanon. Facilitating contacts and good relations with the highest authorities in the country allegedly helped them smooth and promote commercial and financial activities for Hezbollah’s benefit. Both enjoyed diplomatic status as honorary consuls and both had close relations with the former president of Guinea, Alpha Condé, whom the State Department recently sanctioned for his role in human rights violations. The two were sanctioned for financing terrorism, not corruption. Those they presumably bought off were not sanctioned on corruption grounds.
As noted, Hezbollah also exploited close political connections in Gambia during the presidency of Yahya Jammeh, who pillaged his country’s resources during his twenty-one-year rule. Mohammad Ibrahim Bazzi, a Belgian-Lebanese dual national, was part of Jammeh’s inner circle of foreign businessmen who greatly benefited from the president’s corrupt rule. Billingslea, then Treasury assistant secretary, accused Bazzi of involvement in human trafficking, among other illicit activities, which, according to Billingslea, he was able to conduct thanks to his close relationship with Gambia’s Jammeh. The U.S. Treasury sanctioned Bazzi in 2018, highlighting his close connection to what it called “the corrupt former leader of The Gambia who, in addition to ordering targeted assassinations, plundered The Gambia’s state coffers for his personal gain.” Billingslea went further, explicitly accusing Bazzi of involvement in human trafficking, among other illicit activities he was able to conduct thanks to his close relationship with Gambia’s Jammeh. Bazzi sued Treasury to have his designation removed, but failed in his bid and settled out of court in 2021. He remained under sanctions and was arrested in Romania in February 2023, pursuant to a U.S. international arrest warrant on money laundering charges. During Jammeh’s presidency, Bazzi, too, gained the status of honorary consul for Gambia in Lebanon. In this instance, at least, the United States also sanctioned former president Jammeh and his wife on corruption charges.
As the above examples show, throughout the years, U.S. sanctions have occasionally revealed the systemic corruption of ruling elites who act as facilitators for organized crime and terror finance. The Biden administration’s decision to elevate the fight against global corruption to a national security priority is commendable, and it should now systematically highlight the inextricable link between corruption, organized crime, and Hezbollah’s terror finance. While sanctions against corrupt foreign officials make an impact, exposing the ultimate beneficiaries of their corruption, who often turn out to be those paying the bribes, will further multiple aspects of the Biden administration’s national security agenda.
It is corruption that allows the movement of illicit merchandise and dirty money on a global scale. It buys impunity for those engaged in illicit conduct and irreparably undermines democratic institutions as it bends the law to favor criminals, interferes with fairness in the allocation of public contracts, impedes and derails investigations, and in some cases, even leads to the removal, or downright murder, of prosecutors and judges who refuse to take bribes. It also provides influence over political processes and electoral outcomes that can benefit crime and terror finance networks, whose bought-off politicians and officials will continue to protect them. Finally, corruption may grant criminal syndicates and terror groups like Hezbollah critical access to state secrets.
Making global corruption a national security priority is the right decision. Recognizing Hezbollah’s systematic reliance on corruption to facilitate its illicit finance networks would make the White House strategy more effective.
**Emanuele Ottolenghi is a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington, DC-based non-partisan research institution. Follow him on Twitter @eottolenghi.
https://nationalinterest.org/blog/lebanon-watch/hezbollah-missing-president-biden%E2%80%99s-corruption-agenda-206450?page=0%2C1

Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on May 09-10/2023
Israeli strikes in Gaza kill three Islamic Jihad commanders and family members
James Rothwell/The Telegraph/May 9, 2023
Israel killed three Islamic Jihad commanders and at least eight civilians, including women and children, according to Palestinian officials, in a surprise round of airstrikes on the Gaza Strip early on Tuesday. The Israeli military said it had targeted three senior commanders in Islamic Jihad, the second largest militant group in Gaza, as well as ten of its weapon manufacturing sites and compounds. Early on Tuesday morning, powerful explosions echoed around the Gaza Strip for several hours as Israeli warplanes carried out the attacks, including some in residential areas, while video footage showed smoke and flames rising from the sky. Initial reports suggested that a number of the civilians killed in the airstrikes were the wives and children of the three slain Islamic Jihad commanders. Palestinian health officials in Gaza said four children and four women were killed and a further 20 people were wounded, with some in critical condition.
Jamal Akhsiwan, a senior Palestinian doctor, and his wife were also killed by the airstrikes, Palestinian officials said. Israel said the airstrikes were targeting militants that posed an immediate threat to its civilians. “We’ve stopped our strikes for now. Our assets are in the air ready to respond to any threat to our civilians,” added Lieutenant Colonel Richard Hecht, a spokesman for the Israel Defence Forces. In a statement, Islamic Jihad identified the three dead commanders as Jihad Ghannam, Khalil Al-Bahtini and Tareq Izzeldeen. “We will not abandon our positions and the resistance will continue, God willing,” they added. Hajar al-Bahtini, the five-year-old daughter of Khalil Al-Bahtini, and two of Tareq Izzeldeen’s children were also killed in the airstrikes according to Palestinian officials. Earlier on Tuesday, an Israeli military spokesman said they were aware of reports of civilian deaths but did not issue an immediate comment. The airstrikes came during one of the most severe escalations in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in decades, amid repeated Israeli raids on militants in the West Bank, a surge in settler violence and a series of deadly Palestinian attacks on Israeli civilians in both Israel and the West Bank. There has also been an increase in exchanges of fire between Israel and the Gaza Strip, in addition to highly unusual rocket attacks on Israel by militants in southern Lebanon and neighbouring Syria. Islamic Jihad said it would launch an armed response to the airstrikes. “The bombardment will be met by bombardment and the attack will be met by an attack,” said Tareq Selmi, a spokesman for the group. “This crime will not pass unpunished.”Israel on Tuesday morning opened bomb shelters near the border with Gaza, moved hospital patients to fortified areas and closed beaches in anticipation of rocket attacks from Gaza. Hamas, the Islamist group that controls the Gaza Strip, was not targeted by the airstrikes and did not immediately state whether it would launch its own armed response.During a three-day war between Islamic Jihad in Gaza and Israel in August 2022, which killed around 50 Palestinians, Hamas chose to stay out of the fighting. Whether or not Hamas joins the fray after Tuesday’s round of airstrikes will be a key factor in how severely the crisis escalates. Tensions between Israel and Gaza were already high as last week Palestinian militants fired more than a 100 rockets at Israel from Gaza following the death in Israeli custody of Khader Adnan, a hunger-striking senior member of Islamic Jihad. Israel responded to the rocket fire with airstrikes before a ceasefire, mediated by Egypt, the United Nations, and Qatar, was declared. Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month, then enjoy 1 year for just $9 with our US-exclusive offer.

Hamas, Islamic Jihad vow response to Israel's Gaza strikes as West Bank erupts
The Monitot/May 09/2023
Palestinian armed groups in the Gaza Strip vowed on Tuesday to respond to the Israeli airstrikes that killed three senior members of Islamic Jihad as clashes erupted in the West Bank following the attack.
Background: The Israeli air force conducted airstrikes on the Gaza Strip early Tuesday morning targeting leaders of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad — an ally of Hamas based in Gaza. Islamic Jihad said in a statement that the following members of the group’s armed wing — Al-Quds Brigades — were killed:
Khalil al-Bahtini — secretary of Al-Quds Brigades’ military council
Jihad al-Ghanam — head of the “northern region” for Al-Quds Brigades
Tariq Izz ad-Din — leader in Al-Quds Brigades in the West Bank
Islamic Jihad said in another statement to the Hamas-affiliated Safa news agency that the Israeli airstrikes hit residential buildings in Gaza City and Rafah near the border with Egypt. The Palestinian Authority’s Health Ministry said 10 others were killed in the attack, including four women and four children.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) also said that they killed Bahtini, Ghana and Din. The Israeli airstrikes came in response to Islamic Jihad firing more than 100 rockets into Israel last week following the death of one of its senior members, Khader Adnan, who died in an Israeli prison after an 87-day hunger strike.
Reactions: Islamic Jihad said in the statement to Safa that a response to the airstrikes is imminent. “The Palestinian response to this heinous, aggressive massacre will not be delayed. Al-Quds (Brigades) and the resistance will never back down in front of this,” the group said, adding that the strikes “represented a dangerous violation of the cease-fire.”Hamas responded similarly. The group’s political leader Khaled Meshaal called the strikes a “treacherous crime against all our people that will be met with the firm response by the unified resistance,” according to a statement on Hamas’ website.
Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other like-minded groups typically refer to themselves as the "resistance." The Lebanese military organization Hezbollah also released a statement via its news outlet Al-Manar on Tuesday declaring its “full solidarity” with Islamic Jihad. Why it matters: The airstrikes constitute only the latest in a series of escalations between Israel and Palestinian armed groups recently. Last week, the IDF killed three Hamas operatives in the West Bank city of Nablus. The three men were responsible for the deadly shooting of three British-Israeli women near a West Bank settlement in April. The violence in the West Bank continued on Tuesday following the Gaza airstrikes. Israeli forces conducted a raid in the old city of Nablus, IDF spokesperson Avichay Adraee said on Twitter. The Palestinian Authority's WAFA news agency reported that 13 Palestinians were injured during an Israeli military raid in the city. WAFA also reported clashes between the IDF and Palestinians in Hebron in addition to arrests throughout the West Bank. Know more: Israeli Foreign Minister Eli Cohen cut short his trip to India on Tuesday due to the Gaza escalation. Israeli authorities have instructed people living near the Gaza Strip to prepare for retaliatory rocket fire, according to local media.

Israel braces for revenge after killing Islamic Jihad commanders in Gaza
The Monitot/May 09/2023
More than 2,000 Israelis near the Gaza border have left their homes, fearing rocket fire from the strip after Israel's operation on Tuesday morning that killed three Islamic Jihad leaders. Villages and towns in the near-Gaza region are preparing for massive evacuation of thousands of residents, as Israel braces for revenge attacks. The Israeli army had recommended the residents of Nahal Oz and Kfar Aza to leave soon, but it is still unclear when buses will be provided for the residents to leave their homes. Other villages are also making plans for evacuation. Israeli air strikes on Gaza killed three Islamic Jihad militant group leaders and 10 others, including several children, Tuesday, AFP reported. Shortly after the Tuesday morning strike, Israeli authorities ordered the closure of all schools and businesses in a 40-kilometer (25-mile) perimeter from the Gaza border, for all main traffic axes to be closed, as well as the Sapir College. The train station in Sderot is also closed for the day, by order of the Israeli authorities, as well as the border crossing points from Gaza into Israel. The Israeli authorities launched the "breath of air" plan, where Israeli residents of the area are invited to travel to hotels and guest houses across Israel and stay free of charge for a limited period of time, to recuperate from the tension they are under. In a more dramatic move, the Sderot municipality contacted on Tuesday about 4,500 residents — mostly elderly people, new immigrants and chronically ill, who are entitled to be transferred to hotels at the expense of the state — to organize their evacuation from the city. According to the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), the three Islamic Jihad members killed are Khalil Bahitini, commander of Al-Quds Brigades in the northern Gaza Strip; Islamic Jihad spokesperson Tareq Ezzaldin, who also manages the group’s activities in the West Bank; and Jihad Ghanem, secretary of the movement's military council.  Israel’s public broadcaster KAN reported that the operation was originally scheduled to take place last weekend, but was postponed due to adverse weather conditions. The three Islamic Jihad seniors were apparently set to travel to Cairo, but went back to their homes before departing, and it was then that the IDF hit. KAN also reported that Israel sent messages to Egypt, clarifying the military operation was specifically targeting the Islamic Jihad operatives, and not beyond. According to the Israeli army radio, Egypt warned Israel that the attacks in Gaza, recent arrests carried out by Israel in the West Bank city of Nablus and the ascension of Israeli-Jewish worshippers to the Temple Mount are escalating the situation. Islamic Jihad spokesperson Tareq Selmi told Reuters that the Israeli attack “will not pass unpunished,” adding that “the bombardment will be met by bombardment and the attack will be met by an attack.” Al Jazeera reported that Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh warned after the attack that Israel will “pay the price” for the killings of three Islamic Jihad movement members. “Assassinating the leaders with a treacherous operation will not bring security to the occupier, but rather more resistance,” he said. The attack on the senior Islamic Jihad members came a week after heavy rocket fire from the Gaza Strip against Israel’s southern communities, following the death in Israeli prison of Islamic Jihad member Khader Adnan, who was on hunger strike for 87 days. Avenging his death, Islamic Jihad launched 104 rockets at Israel. While most of the rockets fell in open fields, three people were injured in Israel. At the time, Israel retaliated by targeting several Hamas weapons depots. After a day of cross-border violence, both sides agreed to a cease-fire, mediated by Egypt, Qatar and the United Nations.

Saudi Arabia resumes work of its diplomatic mission in Syria
CAIRO (Reuters)/Tue, May 9, 2023
Saudi Arabia will reopen its diplomatic mission in Syria, the Saudi foreign ministry said on Tuesday, nearly a decade after diplomatic ties were cut and two days after Syria was readmitted into the Arab League. Some Arab states, including the United Arab Emirates, have turned the page with Damascus, reversing years of isolation over President Bashar al-Assad's crackdown on protests in 2011 and the ensuing civil war. Sources told Reuters in March that Damascus and Riyadh had agreed to reopen their embassies. The Saudi foreign ministry did not say on Tuesday when the embassy would re-open. Syria's state news agency said Damascus has decided to resume the work of its diplomatic mission in Saudi Arabia. Contacts between them had gathered momentum following a landmark China-brokered deal to re-establish ties between Saudi Arabia and Iran, a key ally of Assad, a regional source aligned with Damascus had said. The United States, an ally of Saudi Arabia, has opposed moves by regional countries to normalise ties with Assad, citing his government's brutality during the conflict and the need to see progress towards a political solution. Some Arab countries are also opposed. The Saudi foreign ministry said the decision would support regional security and stability.

UN chief hopes Syria's return to Arab League helps end war
Associated Press/May 09/2023
The U.N. chief has expressed hope that Syria's return to the Arab League and its engagement with regional powers could spur progress in resolving the 13-year Syrian civil war, as Damascus faced pressure to be transparent about chemical weapons. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said he believes the region "has a vital role to play in the search for settlement of the conflict," which began with an uprising against President Bashar Assad's rule in 2011 that was met with a violent crackdown. The civil war has killed nearly a half million people, and displaced half the country's pre-war population of 23 million. Syria was reinstated in the 22-nation Arab League on Sunday after a 12-year suspension. It was a symbolic victory for Assad, who can join the group's May 19 summit, though Western sanctions will continue to block reconstruction funds to the war-battered country. Guterres' comments challenged regional players to take a leading role in trying to get the Syrian government and opposition to negotiate an end to the war – something that succeeding U.N. envoys have been unable to do. The secretary-general said current special envoy Geir Peterson will "continue to work closely with all key actors," according to his spokesman. At the same time, Syria's chemical weapons program remains a serious and contentious issue. A majority of the world's nations and the global chemical weapons watchdog accuse Damascus of hiding activities, while its close ally Russia defends Assad's actions. Syria joined the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, or OPCW, in 2013 after being threatened with U.S. airstrikes in response to a chemical attack on the outskirts of the country's capital, Damascus. In an unprecedented vote in April 2021, members of the OPCW voted to suspend Syria's voting rights as a punishment for the repeated use of toxic gas. Investigations by the OPCW twice blamed Syrian government forces for chemical attacks and found "reasonable grounds to believe" it was responsible for another attack. At Monday's monthly U.N. Security Council meeting on Syrian chemical weapons, U.N. disarmament chief Izumi Nakamitsu said Syria has failed to address "identified gaps, inconsistencies, and discrepancies" in its original declaration on its chemical program. Russia's deputy U.N. ambassador Dmitry Polyansky, whose country is a veto-wielding member of the Security Council, accused the OPCW of being an "instrument" of the West and manipulating its investigations to blame Syria. U.S. deputy ambassador Robert Wood criticized Damascus' failures to answer the OPCW's questions and "Russia's shameless shielding of Syria's defiant behavior," which he said is leaving the Syrian people facing the prospect of further chemical weapons attacks. He said Russia supported the Security Council resolution adopted in 2013 strongly condemning any use of chemical weapons in Syria and ordering it not to use, develop, produce, acquire, stockpile or retain chemical weapons. But now, he said, instead of supporting it, "Russia has chosen to attack the credibility and professionalism of the OPCW – undermining the U.N. Charter in the process."

Analysis-Arabs bring Syria's Assad back into fold but want action on drugs trade
Maya Gebeily/Reuters/May 09, 2023
Having brought President Bashar al-Assad in from the cold, Arab states want him to rein in Syria's flourishing drugs trade in exchange for even closer ties. But as Damascus makes its own demands, the way ahead appears far from simple. Arab states turned the page on years of confrontation with Assad on Sunday by letting Syria back into the Arab League, a milestone in his regional rehabilitation even as the West continues to shun him after years of civil war. But Arab leaders are seeking a price for re-engagement, notably a halt to the production and smuggling of the amphetamine captagon, which the West and Arab states say is being exported around the region from Syria. Alongside the return of millions of refugees who fled Syria, the captagon trade has become a big worry for Arab leaders, on a par with their concern about the foothold established by Shi'ite Islamist Iran in the Arab country. While denying any role in the trade, for which Syrian officials and Assad relatives have faced Western sanctions, Damascus has sought leverage from the issue. Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad told his Arab counterparts at a May 1 meeting that progress on curbing captagon depended on Arab pressure on the United States to ease sanctions, according to three sources briefed on the meeting. He also linked the return of refugees to funds for rebuilding Syria, from which more than 5 million people have fled into neighbouring states during the war that has killed hundreds of thousands of people. The sources spoke on condition of anonymity. One of them described the meeting in Jordan as "quite tense", saying Arab ministers were disturbed by Mekdad’s tone.
AIR STRIKES
The meeting attended by ministers from Egypt, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Jordan produced a statement in which Syria agreed to help end drug trafficking and to work over the next month to identify who was producing and transporting narcotics. Underlining deep Arab concern over the issue, Jordan carried out air strikes in Syria on Monday, killing a Syrian narcotics smuggler and hitting a factory linked to the Iran-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah, local and intelligence sources said. Hezbollah, which deployed fighters to Syria to aid Assad's war efforts, has denied any role in the drugs trade. Aided by Iran and Russia, Assad steadily beat back his rebel enemies, some of whom had support from U.S.-allied Arab states that have now restored ties. They include Saudi Arabia, which is also mending ties with Assad's ally Iran. The war has shattered Syria's once productive economy, demolishing infrastructure, cities and factories. Captagon has long been a lucrative part of Syria's war economy, estimated to be worth billions of dollars a year. Jordan has told Syria it views drugs as a threat to its national security, a senior Jordanian official said. "The pressure on the border is huge and these are not gangs. It’s clearly supported by Iran-backed militias entrenched within the state," the official said.
COMPENSATION
Saudi Arabia, a big market for captagon, has proposed compensating Syria for the loss of the trade in the event it stops, according to a regional source close to Damascus and a Syrian source close to the Gulf with knowledge of contacts. The regional source said Saudi Arabia had offered $4 billion - based on what Riyadh estimates the trade to be worth - and the proposal had been made during a visit to Damascus by Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan. The funds would be defined as agricultural aid, the source said. The Syrian source confirmed Riyadh had proposed a sum that would be paid as humanitarian aid, but could not say how much. Neither the governments of Syria nor Saudi Arabia responded to requests for comment. A Gulf Arab diplomat in the region said: "They must stop exporting drugs, and they know that the Gulf are ready to invest when there are signs that this is actually happening". Two Western sources with knowledge of Arab contacts with Syria said a pay-off would be necessary to peel state-linked armed units away from the captagon trade. The United States, United Kingdom and European Union have all placed new sanctions on Damascus in recent weeks over captagon. They specifically accuse Maher al-Assad – Bashar’s brother and the head of the army's Fourth Division – of facilitating the production and trafficking of captagon. The United States has said it will not normalize ties with Assad and its sanctions remain in full effect. Speaking to reporters last month, U.S. assistant secretary of state Barbara Leaf noted moves by Washington's regional partners to break the ice with Assad and urged them to get something in return. "I would put ending the captagon trade right at the top alongside the other issues", she said. Mohanad Hage Ali of the Carnegie Middle East Center said Assad's dire need for foreign aid would shape cooperation on both the refugee and captagon issues. But, he cautioned: "The regime’s ability to deliver is as limited as its sovereignty which is now shared among a number of actors" – including Russia, Iran and local paramilitary groups.

Russian troops are deserting in Bakhmut, Wagner chief complains
Nataliya Vasilyeva/The Telegraph/May 9, 2023
Russian soldiers are deserting their positions in Bakhmut, the head of the Wagner mercenary group has claimed as he told the Kremlin that Moscow was incapable of defending its country. Yevgeny Prigozhin, whose influence has risen hugely in Moscow's Ukraine offensive, has in recent days released a series of scathing videos attacking Russia's military leadership. "Today one of the units of the defence ministry fled from one of our flanks... exposing the front," Prigozhin said in a video. He has threatened to pull his fighters out of Bakhmut on May 10 if he did not receive badly needed ammunition. The mercenary group has spearheaded Moscow's fight for the east Ukrainian city. Yevgeny Prigozhin, who has been increasingly unhinged with his criticism of Russia’s military leadership, on Tuesday blasted Russian generals for fighting a war “on television” and leaving his fighters hanging with no ammunition. Mr Prigozhin’s press office put out his video statement just as President Putin wrapped up the annual Victory Parade on Red Square and claimed that Russian troops were successful in “carrying out their tasks” in Ukraine. Mr Prigozhin last week offered the Kremlin a de-facto ultimatum, threatening to pull out thousands of his troops fighting outside Bakhmut by Wednesday unless the Russian defence ministry increases their supplies. He quoted the most recent order from the General Staff, showing abnormally low levels of ammunition to be earmarked, and claimed the military were letting Mr Putin down. “We won’t be able to fight if it carries on like this,” he said. “If the tasks are being carried out in such a way as to deceive the commander-in-chief [Putin] - then either he will rip up your arse or the Russian people will, who will be angry that the war is lost.”Military analysts have said the Russian defence ministry could be rationing ammunition not only to sideline Prigozhin, who has been at loggerheads with them for months, but also to save up supplies ahead of a much-anticipated Ukrainian counter-offensive. The Russian defence ministry never publicly responded to Mr Prigozhin’s accusation but his ultimatum last week triggered an official statement, pledging steady supplies of ammunition all along the front line. Mr Prigozhin on Tuesday reiterated his deadline for leaving the town unless they get all the ammunition they requested. Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month, then enjoy 1 year for just $9 with our US-exclusive offer.

EU takes aim at countries helping Russia to avoid sanctions
Brussels (AP)/Tue, May 9, 2023
A top European Union official on Tuesday urged the 27 member nations to take trade measures against countries that help the Kremlin to circumvent the bloc’s sanctions against Russia.During a visit to Kyiv, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the measures - which would set a new precedent for EU action - should be part of a fresh round of Russia sanctions which the member countries are discussing. “We recently see a growth of highly unusual trade flows through the European Union and certain third countries. These goods then end up in Russia,” von der Leyen said, standing alongside Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. She did not name the countries, but EU officials have raised concerns about certain flows of goods through China and Iran for some time. “If we see that goods are going from the European Union to third countries and then end up in Russia, we could propose to the member states to sanction those goods,” von der Leyen told reporters. All 27 members must approve any sanctions unanimously. Over the last several months, von der Leyen’s commission has become responsible for proposing what sanction action to take, leaving the member countries to thrash out their differences, sometimes over several weeks. “This tool will be a last resort and it will be used cautiously following a very diligent risk analysis and after approval by EU member states. But there should be no doubt that we work against sanctions circumvention,” she said. The bloc has imposed 10 rounds of sanctions on Russia since President Vladimir Putin ordered his forces into Ukraine on Feb. 24. Banks, companies and markets have been hit — even parts of the sensitive energy sector. Well over 1,000 officials are subject to asset freezes and travel bans. Much work has involved closing loopholes so that goods vital to Putin’s war effort do not get through. However, it is the first time that plans have been announced to target trade via other countries, apart from sanctions against Iranians alleged to be supplying drones to Russia. Past sanctions have been agreed in just months — extremely quickly for the EU. But new measures are becoming increasingly hard to endorse as they inflict damage on the economic and political interests of some member countries even as they aim for the Kremlin.

Ukraine says it offered to return 3,000 dead Russian soldiers for burial, but Russia
Mia Jankowicz/Business Insider/May 9, 2023
Ukraine says Russia turned down an offer to repatriate the remains of 3,000 soldiers early in the war.
Russia refused to acknowledge more than a handful had died, per Ukraine's defense minister.
Oleksii Reznikov made the remarks in a new documentary about the war one year on.
Russia turned down an offer to retrieve thousands of its dead soldiers during negotiations early in the war, according to Ukraine's defense minister. In a recently-released documentary, Oleksii Reznikov said Russia's representatives rejected the offer because they wouldn't acknowledge the high mortality rate.
Reznikov was describing negotiations in Belovezhskaya, Belarus, in early March 2022, when he met with a delegation including a Russian deputy defense minister, who he did not name. Reflecting on what he called "the cynicism of the Russians," Reznikov said that Ukraine had counted around 3,000 Russians killed, per translations provided by the filmmaker. He said that he asked the Russian delegation: "'What will we do with the bodies of your dead? Maybe we will give them to you so that their mothers can bury them following proper ceremonies.'" He offered to organize it with the help of the Red Cross, but the deputy defense minister said that Russia had only lost between 10 and 30 men, Reznikov said. Reznokov said he then retorted: "'You may not confirm it, but 3,000 of your bodies are rotting on our land. Then I will pour seeds on them, let them sprout like sunflowers.'"The idea of sunflowers — Ukraine's national flower — being fertilized by the bodies of Russian soldiers is a common symbol of resistance in Ukraine. An edited clip of the documentary was translated and tweeted by Ukrainian-American campaigner Igor Sushko:
Sushko called the Russian reaction a "classic Soviet response."
Two weeks later, Reznikov said he asked Red Cross president Peter Maurer — who had recently returned from Moscow — if he believed accurate death tolls were being reported higher up the chain of command in Russia.
Per Reznikov, Maurer said: "'The deputy minister knows for sure. It was written on his face.'" But Maurer said officials were too scared to tell anyone above the defense minister, according to Reznikov's recollection.
Insider could not independently confirm the numbers of Russian dead at that time. Around the time of the reported conversation with Maurer, tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda published Russian figures saying deaths had climbed to 9,861, citing the Russian MOD. This was at a time when the Kremlin was only publicly acknowledging 498 dead. That figure was quickly deleted, with the newspaper claiming it was hacked. As of May 2023, the US estimates that more than 100,000 Russians have been killed since it launched its full-scale invasion.The Russian Ministry of Defense did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

Ukraine flags block Russian ambassador's path on Victory Day
WARSAW, Poland (AP)/May 9, 2023
A large installation representing Russian atrocities in Ukraine blocked the path of Russia's ambassador to Poland as he sought Tuesday to place a wreath at a Warsaw memorial to Soviet soldiers on Russia's Victory Day holiday. The installation included hundreds of fluttering blue and yellow Ukrainian flags and crosses serving as symbolic grave markers for Ukrainians killed by Russians during the full-scale war launched by Moscow last year. A pool of fake blood below the crosses underlined the message of the protest, which was created by Euromaidan-Warszawa, a citizens' initiative that supports Ukraine. Organizer Viktoria Pogrebniak said the installation was meant to fight back against Russian propaganda, and “show the real picture to the world.” “We are bombed, we are killed, we are raped,” Pogrebniak said. “We are killed just because we are Ukrainians.”The protesters, mostly Ukrainians but also Poles, blocked Ambassador Sergey Andreev's passage to the memorial, which is set amid graves of Red Army soldiers. The soldiers died in the fight against Nazi Germany during World War II. But many Poles also remember how they carried out rapes and other crimes, and they resent the decades of Soviet rule that came next for their nation. With his path blocked, Andreev instead left a wreath of red carnations in front of the hundreds of Ukrainian flags fluttering in the wind as loudspeakers blasted the sounds of bombs and air sirens. The installation also included large mock-ups of bombed buildings and the names of Ukrainian cities where Russia has carried out atrocities against Ukrainians: Bucha, Irpin, Kherson, Bakhmut. Andreev, who was doused with a red liquid at the same place on Victory Day last year, vowed to return later in the day. After he left, some protesters remained in case he came back. Some Poles also showed up through the morning to leave flowers to the Red Army soldiers, triggering the anger of the protesters who denounced them as “provocateurs” serving the Kremlin's interests.

Russia targets Kyiv on Victory Day, parade pared back amid shortages at the front
MOSCOW/KYIV (Reuters)/Tue, May 9, 2023
-Russia fired cruise missiles at Kyiv on Tuesday and paraded troops across Red Square for its annual celebration of victory in World War Two, pared back amid shortages of manpower and weaponry at the front after a failed winter campaign in Ukraine. In a fiery 10-minute speech in front of the Kremlin, President Vladimir Putin thundered against "Western global elites" and said civilisations was at "a decisive turning point". "A real war has been unleashed against our homeland," said the Russian leader, who last year ordered what the West calls an unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, destroying cities and killing thousands of civilians. Underlining how the war has isolated Russia from most of Europe and pushed Ukraine closer to the West, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen was visiting Kyiv, where she called Ukraine "the beating heart of today's European values". The holiday commemorating the Soviet victory in World War Two is the most important day in the calendar in Russia under Putin, who casts his invasion of Ukraine as analogous to Russia's fight against the Nazis. Ukraine, which suffered proportionally greater losses than Russia in World War Two, calls that an abuse of shared history to justify aggression. The parade was full of traditional pomp but unmistakably scaled down from previous years. In place of phalanxes of modern battle tanks, a single World War Two-vintage T-34 rolled across the square. The usual fighter jet flyover was cancelled. Putin's message was also undermined by a new profanity-laced tirade from the boss of Russia's Wagner private army directed at Moscow's generals for failing to give his forces enough weapons. "A combat order came yesterday which clearly stated that if we leave our positions (in Bakhmut), it will be regarded as treason against the motherland," Yevgeny Prigozhin said in an audio message. "(But) if there is no ammunition, then we will leave our positions and be the ones asking who is really betraying the Motherland."
MISSILE ATTACKS OVERNIGHT
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Moscow had failed to capture Bakhmut despite a self-imposed deadline to give Putin a battlefield trophy in time for the holiday. Moscow regards capturing Bakhmut as a stepping stone towards taking other cities in Ukraine's industrial east. Ukraine said its air defences had shot down 23 of 25 Russian cruise missiles fired chiefly at the capital Kyiv overnight, and there were no reported casualties. Russia's defence ministry said it had "launched a concentrated strike using high-precision, long-range sea and air-based weapons aimed against enemy barracks and ammunition depots". After a weeks-long hiatus, Russia in late April resumed its tactic of long-range missile strikes against Ukraine and has launched a flurry of attacks in recent days. The day provided Zelenskiy an opportunity to demonstrate Ukraine's clear break from Moscow by hosting von der Leyen. "Our efforts for a united Europe, for security and peace, need to be as strong as Russia's desire to destroy our security, our freedom, our Europe," Zelenskiy said at their joint press conference.
ROUSING NOTE
Putin struck a rousing note in his Victory Day speech, saying all of Russia was praying for its heroes at the front and concluding with a cheer for "Russia, for our valiant Armed Forces, for victory!". After he spoke, a band struck up and cannon fired a salute. Soldiers marched through the square, followed by armoured vehicles and nuclear-capable intercontinental ballistic missiles. But the Moscow parade was much shorter than usual. Security concerns following attacks including drones that exploded over the Kremlin citadel last week meant parades in some other cities were scaled back or called off. Traditional "Immortal Regiment" processions, in which people carry portraits of relatives who fought against the Nazis, were cancelled. In Kyiv there were no reported casualties from Russia's latest wave of air strikes on the capital. Debris fell on a house in the Holosiivskyi district in the southwest of Kyiv but caused little damage, Mayor Vitalii Klitschko said. Debris lay in a road in Kyiv's central Shevchenkivskyi district. "As at the front, the plans of the aggressor failed," said Sergei Popko, head of the Kyiv city military administration. Russia has stepped up its attacks in anticipation of a looming Ukrainian counteroffensive, after Moscow's winter campaign captured little territory despite the bloodiest ground combat in Europe since World War Two. Russia marks the Nazi surrender of May 8, 1945, on the following day, because it took effect when it was already after midnight in Moscow. Ukraine symbolised its break from Moscow on Monday by announcing it was shifting its observance to May 8. Instead, it proclaimed May 9 Europe Day, a date observed by the EU to commemorate the post-war integration movement that led to the founding of the European Union. "Kyiv, as the capital of Ukraine, is the beating heart of today's European values," von der Leyen said at her news conference with Zelenskiy. "Courageously, Ukraine is fighting for the ideals of Europe that we celebrate today."

UK leads charge for Ukraine to get missiles with 200-mile range
Danielle SheridanThe Telegraph/May 9, 2023
The UK is pushing for Ukraine to be sent missiles and rockets capable of striking 200 miles away in what would be the longest-range weapon to hit the battlefield. It came as James Cleverly, the Foreign Secretary, visited the Atlantic Council in Washington where he pledged Ukraine would be “victorious” in its war with Russia. According to a notice on the British Government's International Fund for Ukraine (IFU) website, industry suppliers have been invited to submit expressions of interest to provide equipment for missiles or rockets with a range of up to 300km to launch from land, sea or air. The appeal, which has now closed, asked for responses regarding the sophisticated weapons system within three days. Addressing the international think tank in Washington, Mr Cleverly said: "There is a strong argument that we shouldn't leave our respective military cupboards bare. My answer is that, you know, if we're saving stuff up for a rainy day, this is the rainy day.”He added that Ukraine needed to be “victorious quickly” and stressed that “the best way of doing that is to give them the tools that they need to get the job done and give them those tools in the here and now”. Mr Cleverly said the UK understood the importance of air defence for Ukraine as he added: "The bottom line is we have got to evolve and adapt our support just as Ukrainians evolve and adapt their tactics to defend themselves against Russia's invasion." Rishi Sunak has previously made it clear that he wants the UK to be the first nation to send longer-range missiles to Ukraine. Speaking at the Munich Security Conference in February he said: "Together we must help Ukraine to shield its cities from Russian bombs and Iranian drones, that's why the United Kingdom will be the first country to give Ukraine longer-range weapons."Mr Sunak stopped short of stating what the weapons would be; however it is felt that Storm Shadow, the RAF’s long-range cruise missile, would deliver the desired effect of disrupting Russian logistical chains. The weapon costs about £2.2 million and can be fired from a fighter jet at targets as far as 350 miles away, although they can be modified to have a significantly shorter range. A defence source told the Telegraph that Ukraine had asked for long-range missiles and as a result the UK was looking at what could be done; however they cautioned that the fund “moves slowly” and it can take “months” to see capabilities made available. They added that the UK has “often led the charge” in supporting Ukraine, citing thousands of Next-generation Light Anti-tank Weapons (N-law) and the 14 Challenger 2 tanks sent to Ukraine, as well as Ukrainian pilot training on RAF fighter jets. In January, Ukraine said it expected the West would send long-range missiles capable of striking almost 200 miles behind Russian lines. They would be used to target Russia’s fragile supply chains, hitting ammunition depots, warehouses and other infrastructure critical to supporting its invasion. With Ukraine’s spring counter-offensive looming, it is understood that the IFU executive panel, which consists of the UK, Norway, Netherlands, Denmark and Sweden, will consider what weapons will be sent. However, a defence source suggested the IFU was not the right system to send a weapon such as Storm Shadow. “If you are going to procure something new or controversial, the IFU isn't the most sensible route to do that,” the source said. Some fear a risk of escalation if the Storm Shadow is delivered to Ukraine, among them Joe Biden, who has resisted Ukraine’s requests for longer-range munitions, limiting weapons to those with a range of around 50 miles. A spokesman for the Ministry of Defence said: “Any decision to proceed with procurement of a particular capability will be made by the IFU Executive Panel, an international board which oversees the governance of the fund.” Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month, then enjoy 1 year for just $9 with our US-exclusive offer.

FBI says it has sabotaged hacking tool created by elite Russian spies
WASHINGTON (Reuters)/May 9, 2023
The FBI has sabotaged a suite of malicious software used by elite Russian spies, U.S. authorities said on Tuesday, providing a glimpse of the digital tug-of-war between two cyber superpowers. Senior law enforcement officials said FBI technical experts had identified and disabled malware wielded by Russia's FSB security service against an undisclosed number of American computers, a move they hoped would deal a death blow to one of Russia's leading cyber spying programs. "We assess this as being their premier espionage tool," one of the U.S. officials told journalists ahead of the release. He said Washington hoped the operation would "eradicate it from the virtual battlefield."The official said the FSB spies behind the malware, known as Snake, are part of a notorious hacking group tracked by the private sector and known as "Turla." The group has been active for two decades against a variety of NATO-aligned targets, U.S. government agencies and technology companies, a senior FBI official said. Russian diplomats did not immediately return a message seeking comment. Moscow routinely denies carrying out cyberespionage operations. U.S. officials spoke to journalists on Tuesday ahead of the news release on condition that they not be named. Similar announcements, revealing the FSB cyber disruption effort, were made by security agencies in the UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Turla is widely considered one of the most sophisticated hacking teams studied by the security research community. "They have persisted in the shadows by focusing on stealth and operational security," said John Hultquist, vice president of threat analysis at U.S. cybersecurity company Mandiant. "They are one of the hardest targets we have."

Canadian diplomat expelled from China in retaliation for similar move by Ottawa
The Canadian Press/May 9, 2023
China has declared a Canadian diplomat as "persona non grata" in retaliation for Ottawa's expulsion of a Chinese consular official, who Canada's spy agency alleged was involved in a plot to intimidate Conservative MP Michael Chong and his relatives in Hong Kong. On Tuesday, China's Foreign Ministry posted a statement on its English website saying China was deploying a "reciprocal countermeasure to Canada's unscrupulous move,'' which it said it "strongly condemns and firmly opposes.''The statement said Jennifer Lynn Lalonde, consul of the Consulate General of Canada in Shanghai, has been asked to leave before May 13, and that China reserves the right to further react. On Monday, Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly issued a statement that Canada had declared Toronto-based diplomat Zhao Wei as "persona non grata.''Calls for Zhao to be expelled began last week after a report in the Globe and Mail that CSIS had information in 2021 that the Chinese government was looking at ways to intimidate Chong and his relatives in Hong Kong. The federal government has confirmed that report. Following Joly's announcement, China's embassy in Ottawa issued a statement that accused Canada of breaching international law and acting based on anti-Chinese sentiment. It said the move "sabotaged'' relations between China and Canada, according to an official English translation provided by the embassy, and promised unspecified retaliatory measures.

Sudan’s death toll rises as warring sides continue talks
AP/May 09, 2023
CAIRO: The death toll from the ongoing clashes in Sudan has risen to 604 people, including civilians, the UN health agency said on Tuesday. The new figures come as representatives of the warring parties are holding talks in Saudi Arabia.
More than 5,100 people were also wounded in connection with the fighting, World Health Organization spokesperson Tarik Jasarevic told reporters. On Monday, the Sudanese Doctors’ Syndicate, which tracks only civilian casualties, said that the fatalities had reached 487. The conflict started on April 15, after months of escalating tensions between the military, led by Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan, and a rival paramilitary group called the Rapid Support Forces, or RSF, commanded by Gen. Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo. The fighting has turned urban areas into battlefields and displaced nearly 700,000 people on top of the 3.7 million who had already been internally displaced within the country before the conflict began, according to the UN migration agency. On Monday, the Saudi Foreign Ministry said that talks between delegations of both warring sides were expected to continue for a few more days in the coastal city of Jeddah. The talks are part of a diplomatic initiative proposed by the kingdom and the United States in hopes of ending the fighting. Meanwhile, Burhan accused the RSF of using residential neighborhoods as their military bases and civilians as human shields. In an interview late Monday with an Egyptian TV channel, Al-Qahira Al-Akhbariya, he insisted they must withdraw all their troops from the capital, Khartoum, before any truce agreement can be reached. “If this is not achieved, there will be no point in going to Saudi Arabia, or engaging in any negotiations,” he said. “We won’t go ahead with any initiative that does not bring back normalcy and ensure the safety of our citizens.”The RSF has not responded to Burhan’s statement.

Turkish, Syrian foreign ministers to meet in Moscow
AFP/May 09, 2023
ISTANBUL: The foreign ministers of Turkiye and Syria will hold their first official meeting on Wednesday since the start of Syrian civil war more than a decade ago, officials said.The talks in Moscow will also involve the top diplomats of Russia and Iran, Turkiye’s foreign ministry said in a statement. The announcement delivers a diplomatic boost to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan just days before he faces the toughest general election of his 21-year rule on Sunday. Erdogan supported early rebel efforts to topple Syrian President Bashar Assad, keeping a military presence in northern stretches of the war-torn country that angers Damascus. But Erdogan reversed course after Turkiye plunged into an economic crisis two years ago. Erdogan has made up with former rivals across the region and is now courting a presidential summit with Assad. Syria had refused, insisting that Turkiye first pull out its troops. A reconciliation with Syria is also supported by Erdogan’s opponents and plays an important part in Turkiye’s election campaign. Erdogan has pledged to speed up the repatriation of nearly four million Syrian refugees and migrants who fled to Turkiye to escape poverty and war. An agreement with Damascus is seen as a prerequisite for this process. Iran and Russia have been helping mediate talks between the two sides.

The Latest LCCC English analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on May 09-10/2023
إرهابيو حزب الله التركي: حلفاء أردوغان الجدد
بوراك بكديل/معهد جيتستون./09 آيار/2023 (ترجمة غوغل)
Turkey's Hizbullah Terrorists: Erdoğan's New Ally
Burak Bekdil/Gatestone Institute./May 09/2023
Turkey's Hizbullah is not to be confused with the Lebanese Shia terror group Hezbollah, although their name has the same meaning in Arabic: The Party of God.
Operating primarily in Batman Province, Hizbullah murdered 188 people in and around the mainly Kurdish city of Batman. The victims included 32 shot in the neck: men for drinking alcohol and women for wearing mini-skirts.
A prominent feminist Islamist, Konca Kuriş, was abducted by Hizbullah and tortured for 35 days before she was murdered. Her Islamism was fine; her feminism was not.
The international community would do well to understand that Kurds, US allies in northern Iraq and Syria, are not monolithic. Secular Kurds are allies. But there are also Islamist Kurds who support Erdoğan.
To win, Erdoğan would ally with radical Islamists: certified terrorists.
If Erdoğan does win on May 14, there will be, for the first time, radical Islamist terrorists in the Turkish parliament. Hizbullah terrorists -- responsible for the torture and deaths of hundreds of people in ISIS-style executions -- in the parliament of a NATO member state?! This potential outcome is the biggest talk among Western diplomats in Ankara. Most are shocked. They should not be. It is vintage Erdoğan.
The terrorists of Turkish Hizbullah regrouped and rebranded themselves as the political party HÜDA-PAR. Everyone knew the new party was a disguise for Hizbullah. Under President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's Islamist regime, no one cared.
Turkey's Hizbullah is not to be confused with the Lebanese Shia terror group Hezbollah, although their name has the same meaning in Arabic: The Party of God. Turkey's Hizbullah is radically Sunni and pro-Kurdish.
At the peak of its violent campaign between 1991 and 2001, Turkey's Religious Affairs Directorate announced that the organization's ideology was "to fight every non-Islamic regime and administration in lands where Islam is not predominant." In those years, Hizbullah had nearly 100 associations and NGOs under its auspices.
After security operations against Hizbullah in 2000, the Turkish public was shocked to learn that the organization had abducted more than 100 rival Islamists, tortured and buried them in what was repugnantly dubbed "houses of graves."
Operating primarily in Batman Province, Hizbullah murdered 188 people in and around the mainly Kurdish city of Batman. The victims included 32 shot in the neck: men for drinking alcohol and women for wearing mini-skirts.
A prominent feminist Islamist, Konca Kuriş, was abducted by Hizbullah and tortured for 35 days before she was murdered. Her Islamism was fine; her feminism was not.
In 2001, Hizbullah assassinated Gaffar Okan, chief of police in Diyarbakır Province, home to the largest Kurdish city in southeastern Turkey, along with five police officers.
In 1992, Hizbullah murdered the journalist Halit Güngen, two days after he published an article about the terror group's covert ties with the Turkish deep state. Years later, the three Hizbullah hitmen, then imprisoned, were released by the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
In 2000, Hizbullah's leader, Hüseyin Velioğlu, was killed in a shoot-out with the police in Istanbul. Former police chief Niyazi Palabıyık, who ran that operation, recently said that Erdoğan's government also released Edip Gümüş, a Hizbullah operative responsible for killing 250 people. The operation and the killing of Velioğlu dismantled the terror group but did not kill its spirit.
Hizbullah's terrorists regrouped, first as an association, then as a political party in 2012. They rebranded themselves with a name not too distant from Hizbullah: HÜDA-PAR (abbreviation for Party of God, also meaning "Free Cause.") Everyone knew the new party was a disguise for Hizbullah. Under Erdoğan's Islamist regime, no one cared.
In a recent television interview, HÜDA-PAR's chairman, Zekeriya Yapıcıoğlu, admitted that Hizbullah "may have been a terrorist organization," but in his view "it was not." He said: "Whenever there was an attack [by authorities against Hizbullah] they had to defend themselves." This is a language too familiar from the defenders of Hamas terrorists -- but not surprising. Yapıcıoğlu was one of the lawyers who defended Hizbullah's terrorists.
HÜDA-PAR's nationwide popularity is estimated to be a couple of hundred thousand in a country where there are more than 50 million registered voters. But even that tiny percentage of voters may rewrite history in Turkey's most critical elections in history scheduled for May 14. Erdoğan is no fool to see that he may need those votes in presidential and parliamentary elections.
Polls suggest that the presidential race will be tight, probably extremely tight. Most show that the gap is widening against Erdoğan. The average of 11 polls conducted in March put Erdogan's party's vote at 32.8% and its ultra-nationalist partner MHP's at 6.5%, with the latter failing to win any parliamentary seats as its nationwide vote falls below the 7% threshold.
By contrast, the opposition bloc would win a combined 55.4% of the nationwide vote. Reuters reported that new polls show the Turkish opposition's presidential candidate Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu leading against Erdoğan by more than 10 percentage points ahead of elections.
This is how the ruthless terror group Hizbullah's child HÜDA-PAR became Erdogan's most recent political ally. HÜDA-PAR declared that it would field candidates under Erdoğan's party's list in the parliamentary election. HÜDA-PAR also agreed to support Erdoğan's presidency.
"We thank HÜDA-PAR for extending their support for Erdoğan's presidency," Erdoğan's AKP Party spokesman Ömer Çelik said after the AKP's deputy chairman Ali Ihsan Yavuz visited HÜDA-PAR headquarters on April 3. Yavuz said that HÜDA-PAR will have "an appropriate number of MP seats" in return for its support for Erdoğan in the May election.
The international community would do well to understand that Kurds, US allies in northern Iraq and Syria, are not monolithic. Secular Kurds are allies. But there are also Islamist Kurds who support Erdoğan.
To win, Erdoğan would ally with radical Islamists: certified terrorists.
If Erdoğan does win on May 14, there will be, for the first time, radical Islamist terrorists in the Turkish parliament. Hizbullah terrorists -- responsible for the torture and deaths of hundreds of people in ISIS-style executions -- in the parliament of a NATO member state?! This potential outcome is the biggest talk among Western diplomats in Ankara. Most are shocked. They should not be. It is vintage Erdoğan.
*Burak Bekdil, one of Turkey's leading journalists, was recently fired from the country's most noted newspaper after 29 years, for writing in Gatestone what is taking place in Turkey. He is a Fellow at the Middle East Forum.
© 2023 Gatestone Institute. All rights reserved. The articles printed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the Editors or of Gatestone Institute. No part of the Gatestone website or any of its contents may be reproduced, copied or modified, without the prior written consent of Gatestone Institute.
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19615/turkey-hizbullah-terrorists

Civil wars are getting longer and more difficult to resolve
Kerry Boyd Anderson/Arab News/09 May/2023
The recent outbreak of fighting in Sudan has highlighted the terrible human and economic toll of civil wars. Sudan is hardly alone. Depending on how one defines civil war, there are between 10 and 100 ongoing today. According to the Geneva Academy, the Middle East and North Africa region has the highest number of civil wars, followed by Africa. Defining the term civil war is tricky, but generally it refers to a conflict that occurs mostly within the borders of a state and in which most of the belligerents are residents of that state. There are different types of civil war and each conflict has its own unique characteristics. A state may have more than one civil conflict at a time. Despite these variations, multiple research projects over the last 30 years have found commonalities among civil wars.
Civil wars typically last much longer than wars between states and recent research suggests that the average duration of civil wars has been lengthening in recent years. The Economist recently reported that the average length of a civil war was nearly 20 years in 2021, compared to an average of 13 years in 1985. Other research by scholars and aid organizations has also found that civil wars are lasting longer.
What factors are driving civil wars to last for so many years? The Economist identified several reasons, including complexity, criminality, climate change, deteriorating global norms and the spread of violent religious extremism. Research from other sources supports those findings and adds other useful points. For example, civil wars are more likely to end through clear military victory than negotiation so, when belligerent groups are unable to defeat and disarm each other, conflicts are more likely to last longer.
An extensive body of research has demonstrated that civil wars are more likely to endure when there are multiple groups involved. Researchers have found that civil wars that end through negotiation tend to be shorter, but negotiating a durable settlement with multiple belligerents is very difficult. Even ending a war through clear military victory is more difficult when many armed groups are fighting.
A related problem is foreign involvement. Academic research has found that interventions by foreign countries in support of one or more parties in a civil war likely extends the length of the war and increases the death toll. One reason is that foreign powers, who do not bear the true costs of the war, can continue providing resources to belligerents who might otherwise have been unable to continue fighting. Foreign countries’ interests can also complicate negotiation efforts. During the Cold War, Soviet and US involvement in proxy wars contributed to their length; today, the involvement of global or regional powers plays a similar role. Long-running civil wars often devolve into war economies, in which armed groups have financial incentives to continue fighting. These actors can make money through extortion and other means. They often benefit from controlling natural resources such as mines or crops that are used for drugs. Once a war economy is entrenched, ending the war becomes even more difficult. Long-running civil wars often devolve into war economies, in which armed groups have financial incentives to continue fighting.
Other factors contribute to some civil wars. Stanford University’s James Fearon, who has conducted significant research on the subject, wrote in 2004 that “‘sons of the soil’ wars that typically involve land conflict between a peripheral ethnic minority and state-supported migrants of a dominant ethnic group are on average quite long-lived.” When religious extremism intersects with armed conflict — such as in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and parts of the Sahel — armed groups often become increasingly brutal and unwilling to negotiate. Climate change is a major risk multiplier that contributes to the likelihood of a civil war occurring, as well as complicating efforts to resolve conflict. At times, the UN has played a significant role in helping to end some internal wars, but when there is paralysis in the UN Security Council its ability to take significant action is hampered. In general, when there is a lack of a willing, capable and trusted third party who can help lead negotiations and monitor agreements, resolving wars is much harder.
It also can be difficult to determine when a civil war truly ends and another one begins. Is the current fighting in Sudan the start of a new potential civil war or is it the continuation of a series of internal conflicts? Did the current war in Yemen start in 2014 or is it the latest stage in a series of wars going back decades or longer? Similar questions could be asked of countries such as Myanmar, Lebanon and Ethiopia, among others. When is it a lasting peace and when is it a pause between wars?
Just as experts have significant information about factors that make civil wars likely and make them longer or more brutal, they also have knowledge of ways to help end wars. Civil wars that end through negotiation are likely to be shorter, while there are historical lessons to help negotiators, such as including women and civil society voices and involving a third-party mediator that can provide some security during combatant demobilization.
However, in situations where belligerents have the incentives and resources to keep fighting — especially if they receive foreign assistance — ending wars is extremely challenging. As always, civilians are caught in the crossfire, often left with little choice except to try to flee, as many Sudanese are attempting today.
• Kerry Boyd Anderson is a writer and political risk consultant with more than 18 years of experience as a professional analyst of international security issues and Middle East political and business risk. Her previous positions include deputy director for advisory with Oxford Analytica.

US politics is being played out on Israeli turf
Yossi Mekelberg/Arab News/09 May/2023
US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy last month led a delegation of American lawmakers to Israel to celebrate the latter’s 75 years of independence. On the face of it, this was a bipartisan delegation of members of Congress, including both Republicans and Democrats. What emerged rather quickly was that, when politicians from two highly polarized political systems meet, both badly tainted by populism, bipartisanship is thrown out of the window and the temptation to play party politics while on foreign and fertile turf becomes too great to resist.
This phenomenon is likely to become ever more common, as the next US presidential election is less than a year and a half away. Few would question America’s cross-party commitment to Israel. However, given the current circumstances in both countries, we can expect that relations between them will play out in both the US elections and Israel’s constitutional crisis.
It is commonplace for high-ranking American officials and presidential candidates to visit Israel — and more frequently when elections loom. It gives them the opportunity to express their devotion to Israel and to have the all-important photo op with Israeli leaders that is supposed to please their constituents back home.However, these are not ordinary times in either country and, should the next US presidential election turn out to be a second bout between Joe Biden and Donald Trump, it will be ugly, nasty, toxic and aimed at the lowest common denominator among the voting public, as will be the contests for the Senate and the House of Representatives. But the last thing Israel needs right now, at one of the most fragile points in its history, is to become a pawn on America’s political chessboard, where Republicans support the Israeli government and its far-right antidemocratic drive, while Democrats oppose the government only to collect some cheap points in their battle to win over American voters.
McCarthy cynically took advantage of his high-profile visit to Israel to undermine the Biden administration
Similarly, it is never clever for any Israeli politician to intervene in American elections, not only because it is wrong to meddle with another country’s political processes, but because it might come back to haunt Israel if it should gamble on the wrong candidate. The close alliance between both countries on all levels, which is crucial for Israel’s survival and well-being, dictates staying out of domestic American politics.
Regrettably, McCarthy cynically took advantage of his high-profile visit to Israel to undermine the Biden administration’s efforts to curb the Israeli government’s current antidemocratic tendencies. It is exceptionally rare for any US president, or any other official for that matter, to openly criticize Israel, even more so when such criticism relates to its domestic politics. But Israel is suffering from its most severe period of political turmoil — one that threatens to harm US interests — which is why Biden, along with Secretary of State Antony Blinken, among others, have not held back from criticizing a Benjamin Netanyahu-led coalition government that, under the influence of its far-right and ultra-Orthodox members, is forging ahead in its assault on the judiciary and hence on the system of checks and balances to the power of the legislature.
Netanyahu desperately needs many of these laws currently before the Knesset in order to obtain immunity from prosecution and derail his corruption trial. For months, Biden has been holding back on inviting Netanyahu to Washington, thereby expressing his administration’s extreme displeasure at the direction taken by the Israeli government. By doing so, he is deliberately depriving Netanyahu of the most coveted foreign trip for any Israeli prime minister, let alone Netanyahu, who has always seen himself as being influential in America’s corridors of power, whether in the White House or on Capitol Hill.
The Israeli prime minister’s desperation for such an invite is becoming even more obvious as his troubles at home continue to mount, with no solution in the offing, for he believes that such a visit would provide him with both the statesman-like respectability he believes he deserves, but also a breather from the chaotic scenes at home.
Biden is making it clear that support for Israel does not necessarily mean supporting every action of its government
However, Biden is rightly sticking to his guns and making it clear that support for Israel does not necessarily mean supporting every action of its government. And, significantly, he is signaling that one of the pillars of the bond between the US and Israel is the commonality of democratic values, without which the other political, strategic and economic pillars are in danger.
For McCarthy to undermine his country’s president by promising to invite Netanyahu to Washington himself, should such an invitation not be forthcoming from the White House, was cynical and irresponsible in equal measure, especially as hundreds of thousands of Israelis are taking to the streets every week in their struggle to save the democratic character of their country. McCarthy’s intervention has more to do with his strained relations with the president than his being a true friend of Israeli democracy.
The response from the White House was swift and US National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby clarified that, to the best of his knowledge, Netanyahu will be invited to the White House at some point, but more importantly he reiterated that no such visit is currently planned. In other words, Netanyahu must first climb down from his antidemocratic tree before he can expect an invitation.
But McCarthy’s was not the only recent high-profile visit to Israel by an American politician. Florida governor and presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis stopped over on an international tour aimed at enhancing his foreign policy credentials and, in this case, he put Netanyahu in an awkward position. Any sign of the slightest positive expression toward any Republican candidate might ignite the short-fused and thin-skinned Trump, who has already announced his candidacy.
In the next few months, first during the US primaries and then with the presidential election itself, the issue of Israel will play a part in this most extravagant political show on planet Earth. Biden will have to walk a tightrope of differentiating between his unwavering friendship and commitment to Israel and his justified criticism of an Israel that is sliding down the slippery slope toward dictatorship and being an apartheid state, because the Republican candidates will be constantly seeking opportunities to attack him on his position. They will do this regardless of the damage it might cause to those who are fighting to try to save Israel’s democratic system, its relations with the Palestinians and its standing in the world, including its long-standing relations with the US.
*Yossi Mekelberg is a professor of international relations and an associate fellow of the MENA Program at Chatham House. He is a regular contributor to the international written and electronic media. Twitter: @YMekelberg

Khader Adnan, the most unifying figure in Palestine
Ramzy Baroud/Arab News/09 May/2023
Khader Adnan was not a “terrorist” with “Israeli blood on his hands,” as pro-Israeli propagandists have been repeating in the news and on social media in the last week. If the former Palestinian prisoner, who died in his Israeli cell last Tuesday following 87 days of uninterrupted hunger strike, was directly involved in armed resistance, the story would have had a completely different ending. Armed Palestinian resisters are either assassinated or detained and tried by Israeli military courts, usually sentenced to prolonged terms in Israeli prisons following brief trials that lack any fairness or due process.
Adnan was a charismatic leader, but not an actual fighter. He inspired Palestinians from his humble home in the village of Arraba, southwest of Jenin, which, along with Nablus, is the home of Palestine’s toughest resistance.
Adnan had a mathematics degree from the University of Birzeit, graduating in 2001. However, due to repeated arrests by Israeli occupation forces, Adnan, then a young man in his early 20s, was denied the opportunity to pursue a master’s degree from the same university in the West Bank.
He was also denied the opportunity to work in his field, so he instead worked in a bakery in Arraba and eventually established his own small bakery in the nearby village of Qabatiya. But Adnan did more than feed the members of his community bread — he also inspired them. It was this quality that put him on a crash course not only with the Israeli occupation, but also with the Palestinian Authority.
Adnan did more than feed the members of his community bread — he also inspired them
Adnan’s first arrest by Israel was in 1999, when the young student was held for four months. After that, he was arrested at least 11 more times and spent more than eight years in prison. On six separate occasions, he carried out hunger strikes, the shortest of which lasted for 25 days. The last was his longest.
Expectedly, Adnan was also an agent provocateur by the standards of the Palestinian security apparatus. In 1999, he was arrested and interrogated by PA security forces for leading a student protest against the visiting French Prime Minister Lionel Jospin. During a speech at Birzeit University, Jospin had lashed out at Palestinian and Arab resistance. To his surprise, a skinny young student in the audience protested, hailing the resistance while speaking out against Western duplicity. Shortly afterward, the French leader was escorted out of the university as angry students pelted him with rocks and shoes.
That was the real danger — and power — of Adnan, who, despite repeated Israeli attempts to charge him for supposed terrorist activities, was only held for prolonged periods in so-called administrative detention — a law designed to silence Palestinian academics, intellectuals and activists who play leadership roles in their own communities.
Adnan, however, could not be silenced.
Unlike his previous arrests by Israel, Adnan’s final detention on Feb. 5 was different. Israel, this time around, wanted to charge him with incitement to violence and membership of an illegal organization. A conviction of this nature would ensure the outspoken man would spend more than five years in prison.
But why now? A brewing armed rebellion in the West Bank, particularly in the northern regions, where Adnan had much moral authority and influence, meant that his freedom could prove costly for Israel. While armed Palestinian fighters are being killed by Israel at a high rate in Nablus, Jenin, Jericho, Bethlehem and Hebron, the rebellious political leadership is also being sidelined through arbitrary detentions and drummed-up accusations.
Indeed, a new leadership has been sprouting throughout the Occupied Territories, offering an alternative not only to the PA, but also to the factional leaderships that seem to operate exclusively around party lines. Though Adnan was affiliated with Palestinian Islamic Jihad, he was a member of the new nonfactional political movement that sought common ground among all Palestinians, regardless of geography, politics or ideology.
From the Israeli viewpoint, releasing Adnan would have set a precedent — the same way that Adnan had forced it to set a precedent many years ago, when he weaponized hunger strikes to gain his freedom. Also, Israel did not want Adnan back on the streets, leading mass protests against the Israeli occupation, speaking of resistance and protesting those who collaborated with the Israeli military.
He was a member of the new nonfactional movement that sought common ground among all Palestinians
So, they simply allowed him to die. Adnan’s wife, Randa Mousa, told the Palestine Chronicle: “On one occasion (80 days into his latest hunger strike), he lost consciousness inside his cell, which was full of surveillance cameras. The Israeli guards only tried to save him after 30 minutes.” Ultimately, he died alone and with no medical attention, to be discovered lifeless inside his cell by the Israeli prison guards some time later.Shortly after the announcement of Adnan’s death, Palestinians from all resistance groups in Gaza fired rockets toward Israel, mass protests broke out in the West Bank and Jerusalem, and a general strike was declared. The young Birzeit student had grown up to become the most unifying figure in Palestine, even after his death. In his will, Adnan addressed his people as one, without a single reference to factional lines or language. He praised the “revolutionaries” and spoke of an assured victory. The references he made to his wife, children, parents, aunties and uncles were interwoven with references to all Palestinians, everywhere, as if he were saying that all Palestinians are one single family.
Despite the potentially heavy price of Adnan’s death for Israel, such Palestinians represent a real danger. They are often poor, humble, community-based, yet unifying figures who challenge a political discourse that has been at work since the signing of the Oslo Accords; a process that divided Palestinians into classes, turning brothers into enemies, and allowing Israel to maintain its military occupation and apartheid unhindered. Adnan, however, was not the originator of this new thinking. He was an outcome of a whole new political culture that has permeated Palestine for years — a mode of collective resistance that cannot easily be crushed, silenced or killed. His death, though tragic, is likely to contribute to the emerging discourse among Palestinians; that of unity, popular resistance and the hope of an assured victory.
*Ramzy Baroud has been writing about the Middle East for more than 20 years. He is an internationally syndicated columnist, a media consultant, an author of several books, and the founder of PalestineChronicle.com. Twitter: @RamzyBaroud

Arab League’s approach to Syria the only one that makes sense
Osama Al-Sharif/Arab News/09 May/2023
After more than a year of behind-the-scenes diplomacy, emboldened by recent unilateral initiatives, Syria’s membership of the Arab League was finally restored on Sunday, when Arab foreign ministers reached consensus on what has been a bitterly divisive issue ever since the eruption of the Syrian crisis 12 years ago. And there is no doubt this was a huge diplomatic victory for the regime of President Bashar Assad, which at one point, before the Russian military intervention of 2015, was on the brink of collapse.
The new Arab approach to resolving the complex Syrian crisis is based on a number of factors. More than a decade of failed attempts to find a political settlement to end this brutal civil war has led to a deadly stalemate, with parts of the country under the regime’s control and others under direct or indirect foreign occupation or influence. This ceased to be a domestic crisis almost as soon as it erupted, with regional and outside parties getting involved and backing various opposition groups, either politically or militarily.
One must not forget the bleak episodes involving foreign extremists slipping into Syria to join the fundamentalist outlaws who filled the vacuum left by the regime to set up an abhorrent, dystopian society. Likewise, documented atrocities committed by the regime — including the use of chemical weapons — will continue to warrant investigation, accountability and a final reckoning.
Syria’s stalemate exacerbated the humanitarian crisis in all parts of the country, as underlined by the aftermath of February’s devastating earthquake. Furthermore, regional and global geopolitical shifts altered the views of how best to approach the Syrian crisis. What most Arab leaders agreed upon was that the current “status quo politics” was unsustainable against a backdrop of shifting priorities, needs and challenges.
The regime must end its cryptic response to the Arab initiative and should, at some point soon, reveal where it stands
What is important to note here is that the process of rehabilitating the Syrian regime is only the beginning. The step-by-step approach is open-ended and it will take years before a true closure to the Syrian tragedy is reached. Meanwhile, the core of the new approach is based on finding a working Arab formula that fulfills UN resolutions on Syria and previous understandings and frameworks under other tracks such as Geneva and Astana, while achieving national reconciliation. It is a tall order and the Arab League’s track record in conflict resolution is disputed at best.
One thing to note here is that any genuine approach to resolving the crisis in Syria, which includes committing to political reforms, the return of refugees and displaced people, dismantling the drug-smuggling network and ending the foreign presence on Syrian soil, all while preserving Syria’s territorial integrity and sovereignty, among others, must rest on a reciprocal formula. This means that the regime must end its cryptic response to the Arab initiative and should, at some point soon, reveal where it stands on such issues.
This is where a number of Arab countries made their reservations. And this is the public position of other key players, such as the EU and the US, with some variations.
For Damascus, outlining its position on the above issues is pivotal if the new Arab approach is to be given a lifeline. Assad is unlikely to abandon his Iranian allies, although he may commit to symbolic gestures regarding the presence of nonstate players. But it is likely to be a long time until he signals any concessions on critical issues such as writing a new constitution for Syria or even talking to the opposition. The latter even appears to have disappeared from the scene. There is also the Syrian Kurdish matter, including their demands for self-rule and the presence of US troops on their territory.
The new Arab momentum has to be taken in light of the historic rapprochement between Riyadh and Tehran
Washington’s response to this latest diplomatic breakthrough has been pragmatic and reserved. While the US says that Syria has not earned the right to rejoin the Arab League, it adds that it understands what its Arab allies are trying to do, which is to jump-start a political solution in Syria. The fact that key Arab partners of the US, such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Iraq and the UAE, are supporting Syria’s political rehabilitation sends a strong message to Washington that its policy in Syria has failed and is currently inert.
The new Arab momentum has to be taken in light of the historic rapprochement between Riyadh and Tehran and its implications for the wider region, including Yemen, Iraq, Syria and Lebanon. A wider perspective must include Russia’s mounting pressure to end the Syria-Turkiye rift, which could be decided by the outcome of the Turkish presidential election next week.
For Syria’s Arab neighbors, namely Jordan, Lebanon and Iraq, Sunday’s embrace of Damascus will be taken much more personally. Amman, for example, sees the Captagon smuggling across its 360 km border with Syria as a national security threat. There are indications that Jordan’s air force launched a deadly strike against a drug factory in Deraa on Monday morning, killing the most-wanted Syrian drug kingpin in the process. This signals a new strategy by Amman in handling such a threat, which, according to various reports, involves members of the Assad clan. Jordan and Lebanon are eager to find solutions that will allow the voluntary return of hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees.
Iraq and Jordan, meanwhile, want to secure their borders with Syria in order to control smuggling, as well as to terminate the pockets of Daesh fighters that continue to pose a threat to both.
Talking to the Syrian regime to resolve a long list of issues, either on a bilateral basis or through an Arab League committee, will not be easy. The regime’s survival has come at a hefty cost and there are new realities on the ground that will make it difficult for Assad to cough up concessions. But in the absence of alternatives, the current path seems to be the only one that makes sense. Hopefully the regime will see the sense in preserving the benefits of its return to the Arab fold and will do its bit to end the endemic political deadlock.
Osama Al-Sharif is a journalist and political commentator based in Amman. Twitter: @plato010