English LCCC Newsbulletin For
Lebanese, Lebanese Related, Global News & Editorials
For December 06/2024
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani
#elias_bejjani_news
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Bible Quotations For today
having been laid on the bed, with the demon gone
out.
Mark 07/24-30/From there he arose and went away into the borders
of Tyre and Sidon. He entered into a house and didn’t want anyone to know it,
but he couldn’t escape notice. For a woman whose little daughter had an unclean
spirit, having heard of him, came and fell down at his feet. Now the woman was a
Greek, a Syrophoenician by race. She begged him that he would cast the demon out
of her daughter. But Jesus said to her, “Let the children be filled first, for
it is not appropriate to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” 28
But she answered him, “Yes, Lord. Yet even the dogs under the table eat the
children’s crumbs. He said to her, “For this saying, go your way. The demon has
gone out of your daughter.” She went away to her house, and found the child
having been laid on the bed, with the demon gone out.
Titles For The Latest English LCCC
Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published
on December 05-06/2024
Elias
Bejjani/Text and Video: Naim Qassem's Speech: Delusions, Illusions, Denial,
Deception, Cunning, and an Attempt to Subvert the Ceasefire Agreement
'Existential threat': IDF thwarted Oct. 7-like Hezbollah raid on northern
Israel, official reveals
Hezbollah leader says $77m allocated to Lebanon war displaced
Qassem stressed on Thursday that the enemy sought to crush the resistance
through its aggression but was met with the “Battle of The Formidable in Might”.
Hezbollah chief says group will be by Syria’s side amid militant offensive
Hezbollah Can Resume Battle against Israeli Enemy with Long-range Missiles:
Official
Lebanon: Al-Qard Al-Hasan Resumes Operations with Compensation for Partially
Damaged Homes
Lebanon medics flee from border area amid Israeli strikes
US Intel: Lebanon's Hezbollah Aims to Rebuild Longer Term despite Israeli Blows
Lebanon medics flee from border area amid Israeli strikes
Hochstein to Visit Lebanon as Berri Receives Head of Committee Monitoring
Ceasefire
Hezbollah Can Resume Battle against Israeli Enemy with Long-range Missiles:
Official
Lebanon’s ‘all means all’ should now be ‘all are welcome/Khaled Abou Zahr/Arab
News/December 05, 2024
Titles For The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published
on December 05-06/2024
UN chief Guterres urges end to bloodshed in Syria
Syrian rebel leader urges Iraq to keep Hashd al-Shaabi factions out of Syria
Why the Syrian conflict is so important for Russia and Iran
Syrian rebels discover Assad Speedo photo in Aleppo takeover - report
UN Food Agency Says Fighting in Syria's Northwest Displaced More than 280,000
People
Syria’s Hama: Key to Controlling Military Operations
Syrian Opposition Captures Key City of Hama
'Charred body pieces everywhere' after Israeli strike sets tents ablaze in Gaza
safe zone
US Says Disagrees with Amnesty International's Genocide Accusation Against
Israel
Israel presents Hamas new ceasefire and hostage release deal
Israel FM says ‘may have opportunity’ for Gaza hostage deal
Palestinian security forces exchange gunfire with militants in West Bank
Ex-Shin Bet chief: Netanyahu asked me to spy on ministers, officers
Israeli court rejects Netanyahu’s request to limit how often he’ll testify
Cyprus takes delivery of Israeli air defense system, report says
Nobel Laureate Narges Mohammadi granted short medical leave from prison in Iran
Satellite images show Iran's new drone carrier has set sail, leaving its home
port for the first time
Blinken, Russia's Lavrov clash on Ukraine at a security meeting in Malta
Titles For The Latest English LCCC analysis & editorials from miscellaneous
sources
on December 05-06/2024
On Siding with No One!/Hazem Saghieh/Asharq Al Awsat/December 05/2024
UN’s diplomatic failure: Why the two-state solution won’t bring peace to Israel
– editorial/Jerusalem Post/December 05/2024
The Race for Nuclear Fusion Energy, the Clean Fuel of the Future: Will China Eat
America's Lunch?/Lawrence Kadish/Gatestone Institute./December 05/2024
France’s ambassador sparks outrage with support for Persian hegemony in Armenia
– opinion/Mordechai Kedar/Jerusalem Post/December 05/2024
Christians in Aleppo: A current situation report/Edy Cohen/Israel Today/December
05/2024
Facing a Historic Test/Hanna Saleh/Asharq Al Awsat/December 05/2024
The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News &
Editorials published
on December 05-06/2024
Elias Bejjani/Text and Video: Naim Qassem's Speech: Delusions, Illusions,
Denial, Deception, Cunning, and an Attempt to Subvert the Ceasefire Agreement
Elias Bejjani/December 05/2024
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/2024/12/137626/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuO6LVRpm1c&t=173s
Sheikh Naim Qassem's recent televised appearance was a disappointing display of
rhetoric and deception. His speech, filled with baseless claims and inflammatory
language, insulted the intelligence of the Lebanese people. Rather than
acknowledging the reality of Hezbollah's defeat and the necessity of the
ceasefire agreement, Qassem attempted to undermine the agreement and perpetuate
a dangerous illusion of victory.
The content of Qassem's speech, like all Hezbollah leaders' statements and
stances since the party's inception in 1982, is a bundle of lies, baseless
rhetoric, delusional fantasies, and sectarian, inflammatory propaganda. This
rhetoric promotes hatred, distorts history, and serves the interests of the
Iranian mullah regime's expansionist, imperialist, and terrorist schemes and
sickening dreams.
Qassem's primary tactic was to downplay the significance of the ceasefire. He
falsely claimed that the agreement was limited to the area south of the Litani
River and only concerned the implementation of UN Resolution 1701. This is a
deliberate misrepresentation of the agreement's terms, which clearly encompass
all of Lebanon and mandate the disarmament of Hezbollah.
By denying the comprehensive nature of the agreement, Qassem seeks to maintain
Hezbollah's military capabilities and its ability to disrupt Lebanon's
stability. This strategy is not only a threat to Lebanon's security but also a
direct challenge to the international community's efforts to promote peace and
stability in the region.
With absurdity and falsification, he asserted that the other resolutions, 1559
and 1680, lack enforcement mechanisms and are solely under the jurisdiction of
the Lebanese state and its army. This is blatantly false. The agreement
unequivocally covers all of Lebanon, mandates the dissolution of Hezbollah, the
handover of its weapons to the Lebanese Army, and restricts the possession of
arms to state entities, as explicitly stipulated in the Taif Agreement, which is
enshrined in Lebanon's constitution.
Some may wonder why Hezbollah agreed to an accord that undermines its very
existence and exposes its false claims about resistance, liberation, and its
grandiose slogans of "throwing Israel into the sea" and "praying in Jerusalem."
The answer is simple: the party faced a crushing defeat against Israel and had
no other option but to surrender.
However, true to its nature, Hezbollah and its Iranian patrons specialize in
deceit, duplicity, and reneging on agreements. Despite their defeat and the
unprecedented calamity they have brought upon Lebanon's Shiite community and the
nation at large, they mistakenly believe they can once again evade the agreement
and renege on its provisions that do not align with their sinister and
expansionist agenda. Qassem's speech falls squarely within this context.
Neither Hezbollah, nor its Iranian sponsors, nor any faction of political Islam,
whether Sunni or Shiite, understand anything other than the language of force.
If they are not deterred by power and compelled to fully and strictly adhere to
the terms of the ceasefire agreement, they will inevitably revert to deceit,
noncompliance, and attempts to rebuild and recover everything they have lost.
To ensure that the ceasefire holds and that Lebanon can move towards a more
peaceful future, the international community must remain vigilant and hold
Hezbollah accountable for its actions. Any attempt by Hezbollah to undermine the
agreement must be met with a strong and decisive response.
'Existential threat': IDF thwarted Oct. 7-like Hezbollah
raid on northern Israel, official reveals
Shaked Saeh/Jerusalem Post/December 05/2024
https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/article-832120
"Terrorists in the North were on full alert, ready to act" against Israel after
October 7, the official senior explained.
A surprise attack was planned on Israel's northern border in the days following
the October 7 Hamas attacks, a senior military official involved in commanding
the IDF's operations in southern Lebanon revealed in a Wednesday Maariv
interview.
The official emphasized that a repeat or imitation of the October 7 attack is
unlikely to occur along Israel's northern border at this stage of the war. He
attributed this to the IDF's efforts in neutralizing terror tunnels, clearing
dense brushlands, and dismantling nature reserves that had been converted into
terror strongholds. Before the IDF's efforts in combatting Hezbollah and
dismantling its infrastructure and weaponry, the senior official revealed that
early in the operation, some 3,000 terrorists were stationed across southern
Lebanon within a three-kilometer strip north of the Israeli border, ready to
invade upon receiving orders. "On October 6, Israel faced an existential threat
without realizing it. The terrorists [in the North] were on full alert, ready to
act," the official explained. He added that what prevented a coordinated
invasion was the IDF’s rapid deployment of four brigades to Israel's northern
border on October 7. Destroying Hezbollah's element of surprise
"The IDF's deployment neutralized the surprise element in Hezbollah’s plan, and
the terrorists realized their plan was no longer feasible since surprise was
central to their strategy, just as it was in Gaza," the official added.
During the IDF's operations in the North at the start of the war, it entered
Shiite and Sunni villages in Lebanon and discovered a massive stockpile of
weapons, including anti-tank missiles, firing positions, and observation posts.
"We destroyed every weapon we encountered, dismantled underground living
quarters, and neutralized Hezbollah's capabilities to conduct its planned raid,"
the official said. The IDF also uncovered numerous local tunnels in southern
Lebanon used by Hezbollah for storage and living quarters, according to the
official. He noted that many of these tunnels were built within particularly
dense brushlands—areas of thick vegetation up to ten meters high—which provided
terrorists with almost complete cover. The thickets, located mainly near the
Israel-Lebanon border, were uniquely dense, hiding all activity within them,
including terrorist movements, weapons, and underground infrastructure. These
covers also allowed Hezbollah to establish firing positions and observation
posts and prepare for targeted raids on border communities. "The thickets served
as Hezbollah’s nature shield," the official explained. "Within the dense
vegetation, they created hidden pathways for terrorists, concealed heavy
weaponry like anti-tank missiles, and even built underground living quarters for
long-term storage." During the operation, the IDF destroyed all weapons found in
the tunnels and living quarters. In addition to eliminating tunnels and weapons,
the IDF's primary goal was to remove the concealment advantage provided by the
thickets. "Hezbollah managed to operate under the radar using the thickets," the
official noted. He added that this exploitation posed a significant challenge
for the IDF. The official also addressed how the military has been working to
prevent the area from becoming a haven for hostile activity again. "These areas
have been turned into open fields," the official explained. "So, any future
attempts by Hezbollah to re-establish themselves will be immediately and
effectively monitored." Even after the IDF demolished these buildings and the
weapons within, this was not a long-term solution, as rearming has not been a
complex task for the organization in the past.
Finishing the job
"We understood that what we had done so far neutralized Hezbollah’s immediate
ability to operate, but it wasn’t enough to guarantee long-term quiet," the
official explained. "To prevent a scenario like October 7 from recurring, we
needed to finish the job."As part of the effort, houses near the border that
Hezbollah had used for storing and manufacturing weapons were completely
destroyed, the official said. The IDF reportedly held a firm stance that homes
in southern Lebanese villages, from the border up to three kilometers into
Lebanon, would not be allowed to be rebuilt, even after an agreement. During the
operation, tunnels up to 70 meters long were discovered. These tunnels were
equipped for extended stays with supplies sufficient for six months."Opposite
every Israeli community, a Hezbollah company was waiting to infiltrate upon
receiving orders. Today, they no longer have the tunnels, underground rooms, or
brushlands that concealed them," the official noted. Only after the area was
completely cleared could northern residents begin to consider returning to their
homes. "Residents we met expressed their emotions, saying they felt safe for the
first time," said the official. According to him, the IDF has established new
military outposts at the forefront of border communities. "We will not rely on
Hezbollah respecting agreements or solely on intelligence warnings. The security
of northern residents is based on the presence of IDF soldiers on the ground,"
he said. "The fighting in the North underscored the importance of coordinated
and comprehensive actions, along with the determination and resilience of the
reservists and their families. This was a historic campaign to restore the
security of Israel’s northern border residents," the official concluded.
Hezbollah leader says $77m
allocated to Lebanon war displaced
AFP/December 05, 2024
BEIRUT: Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem said Thursday that his group and its backer
Iran had allocated $77 million so far to Lebanese displaced by its war with
Israel, with more to come. “In November, Hezbollah decided to give a monetary
gift — a gift from the Iranian people and Hezbollah — of between $300 and $400
for each family,” out of more than 233,000 families who registered for its
assistance, Qassem said. “A total of $57 million has been paid,” covering
172,000 families, or some 75 percent of those registered, while the rest will
receive a total of $20 million, he added in a televised address. Qassem thanked
Iran for “the generous support,” emphasising Hezbollah’s commitment to shelter
and reconstruction. Israel stepped up its campaign in south Lebanon in late
September after nearly a year of cross-border exchanges begun by Hezbollah in
support of its ally Hamas following the Palestinian group’s October 7, 2023
attack on southern Israel. In a report released last month, the World Bank
provided estimates for damage between October 8, 2023, and October 27, 2024,
saying “the conflict has caused $5.1 billion in economic losses,” with damage to
physical structures amounting to “at least $3.4 billion” on top of that.It has
also “damaged an estimated 99,209 housing units” — mainly in the south near the
border with Israel — totalling $2.8 billion in damage, it said. Eighty-one
percent of damaged and destroyed houses are in the southern districts of Tyre,
Nabatiyeh, Sidon, Bint Jbeil and Marjayoun, it said.
Qassem said that in addition to the $77 million already set aside, for “all
those whose homes have been completely destroyed and cannot return to them” in
Beirut and its southern suburbs, Hezbollah will pay “$14,000 over one year” to
cover rent and furniture. Those living in other areas will receive $12,000 for
the same purpose, he added. “Most of the amount will be offered in cash by the
Islamic republic (of Iran) for shelter,,” Qassem said, calling on “brotherly
Arab countries and friendly countries to contribute to the reconstruction.”After
Hezbollah and Israel went to war in 2006, Gulf countries led by Qatar helped
with reconstruction, while Iran assisted with rebuilding bridges, roads and
establishing service centers.
Hezbollah Secretary General
Sheikh Naim Qassem stressed on Thursday that the enemy sought to crush the
resistance through its aggression but was met with the “Battle of The Formidable
in Might”.
Al-Manar English Website/December 05/2024
In a televised speech, Sheikh Qassem said, “For 64 days, we endured sacrifices,
pain, martyrs, and injuries with patience, resilience, and reliance on Allah.”
According to Sheikh Qassem, three key factors contributed to Allah’s victory for
us in this battle:
1. The presence and steadfastness of martyrdom-seeking fighters on the
battlefield.
2. The blood of the martyrs, especially that of His Eminence Sayyed Nasrallah,
which inspired the fighters to persevere.
3. The restoration of leadership and control structures within the party,
enabling effective management of the “Battle of The Formidable in Might”.
Hezbollah Leader hailed the steadfastness of the displaced Lebanese people for
their contribution to the victory, detailing Hezbollah plan to fund the
reconstruction and thanking the Iranian-Iraqi-Yemeni financial support in this
regard.
Sheikh Qassem stressed that those whose houses were completely destroyed will
receive a 14-thousand-dollar pay in order to purchase a new furniture and rent a
house for a year. His eminence also underlined the Lebanese government in
raising the debris, treating the infrastructure problems and contributing to the
reconstruction project. Sheikh Qassem pointed out that the legendary resilience
of the fighters astonished the world, displaying unparalleled courage and
bravery on the frontlines. “We achieved victory because the enemy failed to
accomplish its objectives, marking their defeat. Our resistance remains
steadfast, will endure, and will shine even brighter.”We agreed to the ceasefire
mechanism outlined by Resolution 1701, which is not a new or standalone
agreement, he added.Sheikh Qassem noted that Resolution 1701 mandates “Israel’s”
withdrawal and prohibits armed presence south of the Litani River, adding that
the provisions outlined in Resolution 1701 include mechanisms for Lebanon to
reclaim its borders within the specified timeframe. “Israel has committed over
60 violations of the ceasefire agreement, and the government is responsible for
addressing those breaches. The Lebanese state is accountable for monitoring
Israeli violations, while the resistance provides an opportunity to ensure the
success of the ceasefire agreement.”Sheikh Qassem indicated that “Israel” has no
influence on our internal relationships or our ties with the Lebanese Army,
adding that Hezbollah’s strength stems from supporting the rights of
Palestinians and Lebanese to liberate their land.”We will evaluate the crises
and war we endured, drawing lessons to improve and advance in all fields, Sheikh
Qassem said. His eminence expressed gratitude to those who hosted the displaced,
to the various entities offering support, whether governmental or civilian, and
to the countries that provided aid. Meanwhile, Sheikh Qassem said that the
aggression against Syria is backed by America and ‘Israel’, adding that the
Takfiri groups in Syria were tools serving ‘Israel’ and America. Hezbollah will
stand alongside Syria to thwart this aggression, Sheikh Qassem affirmed. “We
face a dangerous expansionist Israeli project, and I call on you to support the
resistance against ‘Israel’. Takfiri groups aim to shift Syria from its position
of resistance to one that serves the Israeli enemy.”
Hezbollah chief says group
will be by Syria’s side amid militant offensive
AFP/December 05, 2024
BEIRUT: Hezbollah chief Naim Qassem said Thursday that his Lebanese militant
group, an ally of Syrian President Bashar Assad, would be by Damascus’s side as
Islamist-led militants press a sweeping offensive. In a televised address,
Qassem denounced “terrorist groups” who want to “destroy Syria again... to bring
down the government” and “create chaos.”“They will not be able to achieve their
goals despite what they have done in past days, and we as Hezbollah will be by
Syria’s side in thwarting the goals of this aggression as much as we can,”
Qassem said. He did not elaborate on what sort of support his group might
provide, but Hezbollah suffered heavy losses in its war with Israel which ended
with a fragile ceasefire on November 27, the day the Syria militants launched
their offensive. Qassem accused the United States and Israel of supporting
“takfiri” factions, a term the Shiite Muslim group uses to refer to jihadists or
supporters of radical Sunni Islam. Militant group Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS),
led by Al-Qaeda’s former Syria branch, and allied factions launched the surprise
attack and have since seized the major cities of Aleppo and Hama. The militants’
advance in Aleppo province was in an area where pro-Iran groups including
Hezbollah had previously had a significant presence, before drawing it down in
recent months in the face of the war with Israel.Hezbollah has openly backed
Assad’s forces since 2013. Hezbollah fighters helped Assad regain territory lost
earlier in the civil war which broke out in 2011 after the repression of
anti-government protests.
Hezbollah Can Resume Battle
against Israeli Enemy with Long-range Missiles: Official
Al-Manar English Website/December 05/2024
Deputy Chief of Hezbollah Politburo, Hajj Mahmoud Komati, indicated on Wednesday
that the mechanism of the implementation of the ceasefire deal in southern
Lebanon is vague, adding that the US deliberate leniency gave the Israeli enemy
the chance to violate the Lebanese sovereignty.
In a TV interview, Komati stressed that the response of the Islamic Resistance
came after the Israeli attacks on the Lebanese civilians and violations of the
ceasefire. The Islamic Resistance carried out on Monday, December 2, its first
attack on Zionist military sites since the ceasefire took into effect last
Wednesday, November 27, 2024, targeting Ruwaisat Al-Alam occupation post in
KfarShuba Hills area. When Hezbollah realized that the Lebanese and American
officials disregarded the Israeli violations, it carried out the attack on the
Israeli occupation site, which pushed everyone to move to implement the
mechanism of the ceasefire, he said.Komati pointed out that Hezbollah is waiting
for and will cooperate with the committee tasked to overlook the truce
implementation, but that the developments, in this regard are not satisfactory.
Hezbollah will be patient for a period of time, yet can resume the battle
against the Israeli enemy with long-range missiles, if needed, Komati added.
Regarding the Lebanese presidential elections, Komati reiterated Hezbollah
commitment to the nomination of the former minister Sleiman Frangieh, calling on
the parliamentary bloc to reach a minimum consensus in this domain.
Lebanon: Al-Qard Al-Hasan Resumes Operations with
Compensation for Partially Damaged Homes
Beirut: Youssef Diab/Asharq Al Awsat/December 5, 2024
The Hezbollah leadership has announced that its financial association, Al-Qard
Al-Hasan, has resumed its operations by initiating a survey to repair homes
damaged in Israeli airstrikes, restore them, and provide housing allowances for
partially destroyed residences. According to the announcement, “114 engineering
teams have been deployed across Lebanon’s Bekaa region to assess damage,
estimate costs, and distribute compensation.”However, a legal source highlighted
that this activity “violates Lebanese law, as the institution is unlicensed and
operates without supervision from the Central Bank of Lebanon.”The announcement
about the resumption of Al-Qard Al-Hasan’s operations, often referred to as
Hezbollah’s “central bank,” contradicts Israeli claims that the institution had
been destroyed during airstrikes targeting its offices and financial hubs across
Lebanon. The most recent airstrikes targeted the association’s offices in Beirut
neighborhoods such as Hamra, Zoqaq Al-Blat, and Noueiri on the night of November
26, hours before a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hezbollah came into
effect. Al-Qard Al-Hasan, which serves as Hezbollah’s financial backbone, was
established after the party was placed under international sanctions and barred
from holding accounts in Lebanese commercial banks. It collects funds from its
support base and offers loans against collateral such as jewelry. “Al-Qard Al-Hasan’s
operations continued uninterrupted even during the height of the war, with the
party providing assistance to displaced individuals using its own resources,” a
source close to Hezbollah said. The source told Asharq Al-Awsat that the
institution “will finance the restoration of fully or partially damaged homes
and continue to provide rental allowances and financial aid to families unable
to return to their destroyed residences. This definitively debunks Israeli
claims that Hezbollah’s financial infrastructure was dismantled.”The source
added that the institution’s funds—whether in cash, jewelry, or other
assets—were safeguarded in secure locations far from danger. On October 20,
Israeli warplanes launched 15 airstrikes in a single hour, targeting Al-Qard Al-Hasan’s
buildings and offices in Beirut’s southern suburbs, the Bekaa Valley, and South
Lebanon. Three offices in Beirut were initially spared but were later destroyed
on November 26, hours before the ceasefire came into force.
According to the Hezbollah-affiliated source, “while Israel did destroy several
Al-Qard Al-Hasan branches, it failed to harm the institution’s assets, which are
stored in secure locations.”Reports about Hezbollah’s financial stability vary.
A source familiar with the party’s situation revealed that Hezbollah’s cash
reserves were significantly impacted during the war, with Israeli strikes
destroying large sums of money and jewelry stored in Al-Qard Al-Hasan
facilities. The party’s hidden reserves of cash and gold also suffered
considerable damage. The source told Asharq Al-Awsat that reconstruction and
compensation funds are “not sourced from Al-Qard Al-Hasan but are Iranian funds
recently delivered to Hezbollah.” The source claimed that “on the first day of
the ceasefire, Iran transferred $1 billion to the party through a regional
intermediary. This money is being used to assess damages, compensate owners of
partially damaged homes for repairs, and provide aid to families whose homes
were completely destroyed and remain in shelters.”Despite concerns that Al-Qard
Al-Hasan’s activities might violate the ceasefire agreement, Dr. Paul Morcos, a
legal expert and president of the Justicia legal foundation, argued that the
association’s financial activities do not constitute a direct violation of the
deal, as long as its operations are not connected to wartime activities. He
noted that reopening several branches might be Hezbollah’s way of “reassuring
depositors about the safety of their gold and assets while potentially
reactivating its financial resources.”However, Morcos told Asharq Al-Awsat that
“this step remains largely symbolic unless citizens can fully reclaim their
deposits in the foreseeable future.” Legally, the status of Al-Qard Al-Hasan
remains unchanged, as it is “not licensed by Lebanon’s monetary or financial
regulatory authorities to carry out such financial activities.” He explained
that, regardless of the association’s social or religious motives, such
financial operations must be “restricted to institutions registered with the
Central Bank of Lebanon and the Capital Markets Authority.”
Lebanon medics flee from
border area amid Israeli strikes
NAJIA HOUSSARI/Arab News/December 05, 2024
BEIRUT: The Israeli military on Thursday launched an attack near Lebanese Civil
Defense members recovering bodies from clashes between Hezbollah and Israel by
the border, forcing paramedics to leave the area. A few hours before the attack,
the paramedics were subject to Israeli artillery shelling while they were
looking for bodies under the rubble of destroyed buildings in Chamaa village.
Several villages in Tyre, which were previously invaded by the Israeli military
before the ceasefire agreement took effect on Nov. 27, remain subject to Israeli
hostilities under the pretext that the Israeli military has 60 days to withdraw
from the area under the ceasefire agreement. The Israeli forces prevented the
area’s residents from returning until further notice and imposed a curfew on
those already residing in the region. According to the Lebanese Ministry of
Health’s statistics, the expanded war resulted in over 4,047 deaths and 16,638
injuries, most of which were recorded during the last weeks as Israeli
hostilities escalated in different Lebanese areas. The Lebanese Civil Defense
headed on Thursday morning to three villages that were subject to previous
confrontations, using large machinery to continue searching for bodies, most of
which were Hezbollah members. They found nine bodies in Chamaa, six in Al-Bayadah,
and one in Naqoura. A resident of one of the areas that witnessed the
confrontations said dozens of Hezbollah members had been killed, and “we were
unable to contact them for weeks to avoid revealing their locations.”The Israeli
military continued on Thursday morning to destroy houses and facilities in the
border area.
Its attacks included neighborhoods in Yaroun and Bint Jbeil.
The Lebanese National News Agency reported that an Israeli infantry force —
backed by a bulldozer and Merkava tanks — advanced on Thursday morning to the
western side of Shebaa town, where it erected earthen barriers blocking the road
linking the border village to the Naqqar Pond front.
Deputy Parliament Speaker Elias Bou Saab emphasized that Israel’s attacks “are a
flagrant violation of the agreement.”He added: “These attacks are unjustified.
The agreement does not allow Israel to do what it is doing.”Bou Saab said Israel
“tries to justify its actions to the international community under the pretext
of self-defense, but in reality, these are hostile acts and a breach of the
agreement.”Bou Saab affirmed that the ceasefire “was designed to remain in place
and succeed,” adding that “in the coming days, the situation will change ... the
committee tasked with monitoring the implementation process will become
effective, and violations and attacks on the Lebanese will stop.”Representatives
of the committee tasked with monitoring the ceasefire agreement’s implementation
in accordance with UN Resolution 1701 have arrived. On Wednesday, the Lebanese
military redeployed in three locations in Shebaa while consolidating its forces
in Tyre over the past two days in preparation for redeployment in the border
area following the withdrawal of the Israeli military. Also on Thursday, the
head of the ceasefire monitoring committee, US Gen. Jasper Jeffers, and the
accompanying military delegation met with Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih
Berri. Berri’s media office said the meeting included “a review of the field
conditions since the ceasefire took effect and the committee's tasks.”Caretaker
Prime Minister Najib Mikati received the French representative, Gen. Guillaume
Ponchin, who arrived in Beirut at the head of a military delegation. Mikati’s
media office said he emphasized the Lebanese priorities, which include the
cessation of fire, halting Israeli violations, the withdrawal of the Israeli
military from Lebanese territories, and strengthening the deployment of the
Lebanese military in the south. The ceasefire monitoring committee is scheduled
to hold its first official and operational meeting next Tuesday in Naqoura, a
border town that hosts the UNIFIL headquarters.
Representatives from Lebanon, Israel, and UNIFIL will join.
A preliminary meeting of the committee is expected within the next 24 hours.
Lebanon is closely watching the start of the monitoring committee’s work, which
relies on halting the Israeli violations, officially recorded as exceeding 100
breaches. The committee’s work under the agreement will focus on “monitoring the
borders and preventing violations, with each party (Lebanon and Israel)
reporting any perceived threats to the committee.”The Lebanese Cabinet is
scheduled to hold an exceptional session on Saturday in a military barracks in
the southern city of Tyre. This symbolic step aims to show solidarity with the
areas affected by Israeli attacks, including Tyre, which lies just a few
kilometers from the confrontation lines with the Israeli military. The Lebanese
Cabinet will hold a special session on Saturday at a military barracks in the
southern Lebanese city of Tyre in a symbolic move aimed at expressing solidarity
with the areas affected by Israeli attacks, including Tyre, which is just a few
kilometers away from the frontlines with the Israeli military. The session will
be attended by Army Commander Gen. Joseph Aoun, who will brief ministers on the
army’s deployment plan in the south. Meanwhile, Hezbollah organized a field tour
for media professionals in the south, starting in Chehaybiyeh and its commercial
market, followed by Khirbet Selm and Souaneh. Hezbollah MP Ali Fayyad said: “The
operation carried out by Hezbollah last Monday, which targeted the Israeli
Ruwaysat Al-Alam site in the occupied Lebanese Shebaa Farms, was a preliminary
defensive reminder in response to the attacks and violations carried out by
Israel over the past few days.”
He said Israel had left no act undone in its attack on civilian targets.
In Kfarkela, Israeli forces targeted sports facilities, and in Khiam, they
continued to destroy homes and demolish roads. They have also demolished places
of worship in other areas. He added: “These practices cannot be seen as
adherence to the ceasefire agreement procedures. “They exceed the agreement,
undermining both the established protocols and the credibility of monitoring
bodies.”Fayyad stressed Lebanon’s right to defend itself and the people’s right
to respond to these aggressions. “The goal of the procedures is Israeli
withdrawal, not making way to villages that it did not advance toward during the
confrontations with the resistance,” he added. He said that this puts the US “in
a position of direct responsibility and full partnership in these violations,
which undermine the implementation of the ceasefire procedures and represent a
threat to the agreed-upon mechanism. “We emphasize our commitment to the
declaration of the cessation of hostilities stipulated in the paper and
Lebanon's right to defend itself.”Fayyad reaffirmed “the confidence in the
important role of the Lebanese military, which is a pillar in protecting
national sovereignty and security. “Coordination and continuous follow-up with
the army are ongoing,” he said. Hezbollah MP Hussein Al-Hajj Hassan emphasized
that Hezbollah “remains committed to the cessation of hostilities with Israel
and to the agreement.”Regarding Hezbollah’s strength, Al-Hajj Hassan said that
“the party has not weakened, and its will remains strong. “It has come out of a
major aggression; no one could crush it, and it will only grow stronger. “It is
not an organization isolated from its people; It has allies who stood by it
during the aggression and a large parliamentary bloc with many allies.”
US Intel: Lebanon's Hezbollah Aims to Rebuild Longer Term despite Israeli Blows
Asharq Al Awsat/December 05/2024
Lebanon's Hezbollah has been significantly degraded militarily by Israel, but
the Iran-backed group will likely try to rebuild its stockpiles and forces and
pose a long term threat to the US and its regional allies, four sources briefed
on updated US intelligence told Reuters. US intelligence agencies assessed in
recent weeks that Hezbollah, even amid Israel's military campaign, had begun to
recruit new fighters and was trying to find ways to rearm through domestic
production and by smuggling materials through Syria, said a senior US official,
an Israeli official and two US lawmakers briefed on the intelligence, speaking
on condition of anonymity. It's unclear to what extent those efforts have slowed
since last week when Hezbollah and Israel reached a shaky ceasefire, two of the
sources said. The deal specifically prohibits Hezbollah from procuring weapons
or weapons parts.In recent days, Israel has tried to undercut Hezbollah's
ability to rebuild its military forces, striking several Hezbollah rocket
launchers in Lebanon, bombing border crossings with Syria, and blocking an
Iranian aircraft suspected of ferrying weapons for the group. US intelligence
agencies assess that Hezbollah is operating with limited firepower. It has lost
more than half its weapons stockpiles and thousands of fighters during the
conflict with Israel, reducing Tehran's overall military capacity to its lowest
point in decades, according to the intelligence. But Hezbollah has not been
destroyed. It still maintains thousands of short-range rockets in Lebanon and it
will try to rebuild using weapons factories in neighboring countries with
available transport routes, the sources said. One of the lawmakers said
Hezbollah has been "knocked back" in the short term and had its ability to
conduct command and control reduced. But the lawmaker added: "This organization
is designed to be disrupted."
US officials are concerned about Hezbollah's access to Syria, where Syrian
opposition factions recently launched an offensive to retake government
strongholds in Aleppo and Hama. Hezbollah has long used Syria as a safe haven
and transport hub, taking military equipment and weapons from Iraq, through
Syria and into Lebanon through the rugged border crossings. Washington is trying
to pressure Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to limit Hezbollah's operations,
enlisting other countries in the region to help, a senior US official said.
Reuters reported on Monday that the US is weighing the possibility of lifting
sanctions on Assad if he peels himself away from Iran and cuts off weapons
routes to Hezbollah. Hezbollah officials have said the group will continue to
function as a "resistance" against Israel, but its secretary general Naim Qassem
has not brought up the group's weapons in recent speeches, including after the
ceasefire was reached. Sources in Lebanon say Hezbollah's priority is rebuilding
homes for its constituency after Israeli strikes destroyed swaths of Lebanon's
south and the southern suburbs of Beirut. The US National Security Council and
the Office of the Director for National Intelligence declined to comment on the
updated US intelligence.
TRAINING CHALLENGES
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi said last week that Hezbollah had not
been weakened by Israel's killing of many of its leaders since January and by
its ground assault against the group since early October. He said Hezbollah had
been able to reorganize and fight back effectively.
However, US intelligence indicates that Israel has taken out thousands of
Hezbollah's missiles in Lebanon, pushing cadres of its fighters back from the
border with Israel, the sources told Reuters. While tracking the exact number of
Hezbollah fighters remains a challenge, the intelligence notes that the group
will likely face significant training challenges for years to come, the sources
said. US officials say Hezbollah's breakdown points to a growing gap in Iran's
military capacity and raises doubts about its ability to use its proxies to
attack Israel and its other adversaries in the short term. Iran also backs Hamas
militants in the Gaza Strip and the Houthi group in Yemen. In the past, had
Israel considered bombing Iran, it faced the prospect of Hezbollah in Lebanon
reciprocating, said a second US official, but with Hezbollah weakened, Israel
can attack Iran directly without the same threat to its north.
In Gaza, US intelligence indicates Hamas can only sustain small, guerrilla-style
tactics after having lost at least half of its fighters. The Houthis continue to
launch missiles and drones from Yemen, but the US has been able to intercept
most. The updated US intelligence - briefed to senior officials and lawmakers in
recent weeks - emerges ahead of US President-elect Donald Trump's Jan. 20
inauguration. The US charged an Iranian man last month in connection with an
alleged Iranian plot to assassinate Trump. Iran has rejected the accusation.
During his first term in office, Trump embraced a "maximum pressure" campaign on
Iran, imposing harsh sanctions on Tehran, its military complex and its most
lucrative economic sectors. Trump in 2018 pulled the US out of a 2015
international agreement meant to deny Tehran the ability to build nuclear
weapons. In 2020 Trump was responsible for a strike in Iraq that killed top
Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani.
Lebanon medics flee from
border area amid Israeli strikes
NAJIA HOUSSARI/Arab News/December 05, 2024
BEIRUT: The Israeli military on Thursday launched an attack near Lebanese Civil
Defense members recovering bodies from clashes between Hezbollah and Israel by
the border, forcing paramedics to leave the area. A few hours before the attack,
the paramedics were subject to Israeli artillery shelling while they were
looking for bodies under the rubble of destroyed buildings in Chamaa village.
Several villages in Tyre, which were previously invaded by the Israeli military
before the ceasefire agreement took effect on Nov. 27, remain subject to Israeli
hostilities under the pretext that the Israeli military has 60 days to withdraw
from the area under the ceasefire agreement. The Israeli forces prevented the
area’s residents from returning until further notice and imposed a curfew on
those already residing in the region. According to the Lebanese Ministry of
Health’s statistics, the expanded war resulted in over 4,047 deaths and 16,638
injuries, most of which were recorded during the last weeks as Israeli
hostilities escalated in different Lebanese areas. The Lebanese Civil Defense
headed on Thursday morning to three villages that were subject to previous
confrontations, using large machinery to continue searching for bodies, most of
which were Hezbollah members.
They found nine bodies in Chamaa, six in Al-Bayadah, and one in Naqoura.
A resident of one of the areas that witnessed the confrontations said dozens of
Hezbollah members had been killed, and “we were unable to contact them for weeks
to avoid revealing their locations.”The Israeli military continued on Thursday
morning to destroy houses and facilities in the border area. Its attacks
included neighborhoods in Yaroun and Bint Jbeil. The Lebanese National News
Agency reported that an Israeli infantry force — backed by a bulldozer and
Merkava tanks — advanced on Thursday morning to the western side of Shebaa town,
where it erected earthen barriers blocking the road linking the border village
to the Naqqar Pond front. Deputy Parliament Speaker Elias Bou Saab emphasized
that Israel’s attacks “are a flagrant violation of the agreement.”He added:
“These attacks are unjustified. The agreement does not allow Israel to do what
it is doing.”Bou Saab said Israel “tries to justify its actions to the
international community under the pretext of self-defense, but in reality, these
are hostile acts and a breach of the agreement.”Bou Saab affirmed that the
ceasefire “was designed to remain in place and succeed,” adding that “in the
coming days, the situation will change ... the committee tasked with monitoring
the implementation process will become effective, and violations and attacks on
the Lebanese will stop.”Representatives of the committee tasked with monitoring
the ceasefire agreement’s implementation in accordance with UN Resolution 1701
have arrived. On Wednesday, the Lebanese military redeployed in three locations
in Shebaa while consolidating its forces in Tyre over the past two days in
preparation for redeployment in the border area following the withdrawal of the
Israeli military. Also on Thursday, the head of the ceasefire monitoring
committee, US Gen. Jasper Jeffers, and the accompanying military delegation met
with Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri. Berri’s media office said the
meeting included “a review of the field conditions since the ceasefire took
effect and the committee's tasks.”
Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati received the French representative, Gen.
Guillaume Ponchin, who arrived in Beirut at the head of a military delegation.
Mikati’s media office said he emphasized the Lebanese priorities, which include
the cessation of fire, halting Israeli violations, the withdrawal of the Israeli
military from Lebanese territories, and strengthening the deployment of the
Lebanese military in the south. The ceasefire monitoring committee is scheduled
to hold its first official and operational meeting next Tuesday in Naqoura, a
border town that hosts the UNIFIL headquarters. Representatives from Lebanon,
Israel, and UNIFIL will join.
A preliminary meeting of the committee is expected within the next 24 hours.
Lebanon is closely watching the start of the monitoring committee’s work, which
relies on halting the Israeli violations, officially recorded as exceeding 100
breaches. The committee’s work under the agreement will focus on “monitoring the
borders and preventing violations, with each party (Lebanon and Israel)
reporting any perceived threats to the committee.”The Lebanese Cabinet is
scheduled to hold an exceptional session on Saturday in a military barracks in
the southern city of Tyre. This symbolic step aims to show solidarity with the
areas affected by Israeli attacks, including Tyre, which lies just a few
kilometers from the confrontation lines with the Israeli military. The Lebanese
Cabinet will hold a special session on Saturday at a military barracks in the
southern Lebanese city of Tyre in a symbolic move aimed at expressing solidarity
with the areas affected by Israeli attacks, including Tyre, which is just a few
kilometers away from the frontlines with the Israeli military. The session will
be attended by Army Commander Gen. Joseph Aoun, who will brief ministers on the
army’s deployment plan in the south. Meanwhile, Hezbollah organized a field tour
for media professionals in the south, starting in Chehaybiyeh and its commercial
market, followed by Khirbet Selm and Souaneh. Hezbollah MP Ali Fayyad said: “The
operation carried out by Hezbollah last Monday, which targeted the Israeli
Ruwaysat Al-Alam site in the occupied Lebanese Shebaa Farms, was a preliminary
defensive reminder in response to the attacks and violations carried out by
Israel over the past few days.”He said Israel had left no act undone in its
attack on civilian targets.
In Kfarkela, Israeli forces targeted sports facilities, and in Khiam, they
continued to destroy homes and demolish roads. They have also demolished places
of worship in other areas. He added: “These practices cannot be seen as
adherence to the ceasefire agreement procedures. “They exceed the agreement,
undermining both the established protocols and the credibility of monitoring
bodies.”Fayyad stressed Lebanon’s right to defend itself and the people’s right
to respond to these aggressions. “The goal of the procedures is Israeli
withdrawal, not making way to villages that it did not advance toward during the
confrontations with the resistance,” he added. He said that this puts the US “in
a position of direct responsibility and full partnership in these violations,
which undermine the implementation of the ceasefire procedures and represent a
threat to the agreed-upon mechanism. “We emphasize our commitment to the
declaration of the cessation of hostilities stipulated in the paper and
Lebanon's right to defend itself.”Fayyad reaffirmed “the confidence in the
important role of the Lebanese military, which is a pillar in protecting
national sovereignty and security.
“Coordination and continuous follow-up with the army are ongoing,” he
said.Hezbollah MP Hussein Al-Hajj Hassan emphasized that Hezbollah “remains
committed to the cessation of hostilities with Israel and to the
agreement.”Regarding Hezbollah’s strength, Al-Hajj Hassan said that “the party
has not weakened, and its will remains strong. “It has come out of a major
aggression; no one could crush it, and it will only grow stronger. “It is not an
organization isolated from its people; It has allies who stood by it during the
aggression and a large parliamentary bloc with many allies.”
Hochstein to Visit Lebanon as Berri Receives Head of Committee Monitoring
Ceasefire
Al-Manar English Website/December 05/2024
Lebanese Speaker Nabih Berri met with the head of the US-led Committee
Monitoring the Ceasefire in Lebanon, as the US special envoy Amos Hochstein is
to visit Beirut in the coming days, a report said on Thursday. The meeting,
attended by US Ambassador Lisa Johnson and Berri’s media advisor Ali Hamdan,
focused on the general situation, particularly field developments since the
ceasefire took effect, and the committee’s responsibilities, according to the
NNA. Meanwhile on Thursday, Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar reported that
Hochstein, who oversaw the negotiations for a ceasefire between the Zionist
entity and the Hezbollah, will visit Beirut in the coming days for talks with
the oversight body responsible for overseeing the implementation of the
agreement.According to the report, the body has not yet begun work, and a
Lebanese government source told the paper that “nobody understands the reason”
for the delay. When meeting with Hochstein, Al-Akhbar said Lebanese government
officials will ask him to pressure the Zionist entity into easing off its
strikes in southern Lebanon, which violate the ceasefire and the Lebanese
sovereignty.
Sheikh Qassem: Victorious Hezbollah Committed to Reconstruction and Funding
Project of Housing the Displaced
Hezbollah Can Resume Battle
against Israeli Enemy with Long-range Missiles: Official
Al-Manar English Website/December 05/2024
Deputy Chief of Hezbollah Politburo, Hajj Mahmoud Komati, indicated on Wednesday
that the mechanism of the implementation of the ceasefire deal in southern
Lebanon is vague, adding that the US deliberate leniency gave the Israeli enemy
the chance to violate the Lebanese sovereignty.
In a TV interview, Komati stressed that the response of the Islamic Resistance
came after the Israeli attacks on the Lebanese civilians and violations of the
ceasefire. The Islamic Resistance carried out on Monday, December 2, its first
attack on Zionist military sites since the ceasefire took into effect last
Wednesday, November 27, 2024, targeting Ruwaisat Al-Alam occupation post in
KfarShuba Hills area. When Hezbollah realized that the Lebanese and American
officials disregarded the Israeli violations, it carried out the attack on the
Israeli occupation site, which pushed everyone to move to implement the
mechanism of the ceasefire, he said.Komati pointed out that Hezbollah is waiting
for and will cooperate with the committee tasked to overlook the truce
implementation, but that the developments, in this regard are not satisfactory.
Hezbollah will be patient for a period of time, yet can resume the battle
against the Israeli enemy with long-range missiles, if needed, Komati added.
Regarding the Lebanese presidential elections, Komati reiterated Hezbollah
commitment to the nomination of the former minister Sleiman Frangieh, calling on
the parliamentary bloc to reach a minimum consensus in this domain.
Lebanon’s ‘all means all’ should now be ‘all are welcome’
Khaled Abou Zahr/Arab News/December 05, 2024
In recent decades, European politicians have been vocal about the fate of
religious minorities in the Middle East and, more precisely, the Levant. There
has indeed been cause for alarm and despair about their persecution and
treatment as second-class citizens, especially in Iraq and Syria. Their
dwindling numbers are worrisome. Europe’s history, which has been marked by
horrific failures in its treatment of minorities, offers more valuable lessons
than the statements of today’s politicians. The lesson is crystal clear: when
minorities are excluded or lost, countries lose dynamism and opportunities for
prosperity and growth.
There are many cases in European history, but I would like to focus on two that
took place in France: the expulsion of the Jews and the revocation of the Edict
of Nantes. These are two significant episodes in French history that brought
about profound losses to the country.
Jews were expelled from France several times in the Middle Ages. The main
episodes took place in 1306 under Philippe IV and 1394 under Charles VI, when
their property was confiscated and their role in the economy eliminated.
However, this deprived France of vibrant communities that excelled in trade,
medicine and science and whose contributions could have enriched society in the
long term. The French economy suffered from their loss and the country’s culture
and knowledge were impoverished by their exclusion. The Jews’ return came during
the Renaissance, which was a golden age for Europe.
Similarly, the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685 by Louis XIV had
disastrous consequences for France. This act forced hundreds of thousands of
Protestants, known as Huguenots, into exile, taking with them their craft,
commercial and industrial skills. France lost true craftsmen, such as
watchmakers, printers, merchants and scientists, who had contributed to the
country’s economic development. This decision contributed to the weakening of
France’s long-term competitiveness.
When minorities are excluded or lost, countries lose dynamism and opportunities
for prosperity and growth. Both events show how losing an important community
that is contributing to the nation can impoverish a country. It is worth
mentioning that the exile of the Huguenots greatly contributed to the rise of
industry in England and the Netherlands, to the detriment of France.
Although the context differs, the loss of Muslims in Spain with the Reconquista
led to a decline in the country’s knowledge of medicine, philosophy and
astronomy. With that in mind, we should be wary of voices in the Levant region
that portray minorities as outsiders. They are, in fact, an integral part of the
Levant’s DNA. Many families that originate in the Levant have branches that span
across various religions, underscoring how deeply interconnected we all are.
The reality is that the armed conflicts of recent decades have been the main
reason for this loss. Religious minorities are often targeted, as we saw with
Daesh’s treatment of the Yazidi and Christian communities in Iraq and Syria. In
the end, the targeting of a single community brings despair and chaos to the
entire country and even the region. We share the same DNA and are intertwined,
so splitting apart is disastrous for all. Yet, beyond conflict, can we still
live together?
Today, the Gulf countries show us how cultural and religious diversity can be a
strength when managed well. These states have welcomed populations of diverse
origins that now coexist and contribute to vibrant economies. This diversity has
enabled the Gulf states to become global hubs of trade, finance and culture.
Yet, there is a key element for this to succeed, which is order and respect of
the other, aligned with vision. The Gulf countries have preserved their identity
and values, while allowing others to live in security, putting mutual respect
and abiding by the law above all.
The Gulf countries show us how cultural and religious diversity can be a
strength when managed well. So, how do we change the negative dynamic in the
Levant? How do we use this example to rebuild better? Despite the volatile
situation, Lebanon could be the start of this reemergence. Lebanon lived in an
age of stability and prosperity in the late 1960s and early 1970s. How and why?
I see a clear answer. There is no doubt that Lebanon would not be the same
without the Maronites. It was their love for and commitment to the Cedar that
spread to the rest of the population.
Lebanon lived its golden age and blessed times when Maronites made up half the
population. With the civil war, today’s economic pressures and Hezbollah’s
kidnapping of the country, their numbers have reduced greatly and so has the
prosperity of the country. I will say, once and only once, that correlation
indeed implies causation.
One thing is clear, Lebanon will not continue on its current path. This much is
certain. Just as in investing, there is a price barrier or a resistance point,
after which a stock either increases or plummets. If Lebanon crosses the next
barrier, we are heading for a Somalia-style scenario, in which the borders with
Syria will mean nothing. The awakening can only come if we bring back all the
lost communities and allow for their protection. Just as the protest slogan “all
means all” was meant to rid the country of its entire political elite, we should
push for “all means all” to allow for all minority communities to come back and
live in peace, without fear. It starts with a vision, insulating Lebanon from
neighboring events and protecting the borders. We all know what is necessary and
need the capacity to execute it.
**Khaled Abou Zahr is the founder of SpaceQuest Ventures, a space-focused
investment platform. He is CEO of EurabiaMedia and editor of Al-Watan Al-Arabi.
The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published
on December 05-06/2024
UN
chief Guterres urges end to bloodshed in Syria
Reuters/December 5, 2024
There is an urgent need for immediate humanitarian access to all civilians in
need in Syria and a return to a U.N.-facilitated political process to end the
bloodshed, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Thursday.
He urged "all those with influence to do their part for the long-suffering
people" of Syria and said all parties are obligated to protect civilians. "Tens
of thousands of civilians are at risk in a region already on fire," Guterres
told reporters. "We are seeing the bitter fruits of a chronic collective failure
of previous de-escalation arrangements to produce a genuine nationwide ceasefire
or a serious political process to implement Security Council resolutions," he
said. Syrian rebels captured the city of Hama on Thursday, a major victory in a
week-old lightning advance across northern Syria and a devastating new blow to
President Bashar al-Assad and his Russian and Iranian allies.
Syrian rebel leader
urges Iraq to keep Hashd al-Shaabi factions out of Syria
Reuters/December 5, 2024
Syria's most powerful rebel leader Abu Mohammed al-Golani urged Iraqi Prime
Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani not to allow the country's Iran-aligned Popular
Mobilization Forces (PMF) to intervene in Syria, in a video statement posted on
Thursday. The PMF, known as the Hashd al-Shaabi in Arabic, contains many
Iran-backed armed factions that previously fought in Syria to help Syrian
President Bashar al-Assad retake territory that fell to rebels in the early
years of the Syrian war. "We urge and hope Iraqi politicians, first and foremost
Mohammed Shia al-Sudani... do their duty to prevent the Iraqi Hashd al-Shaabi's
intervention in what is happening in Syria," Golani said. The PMF has said that
it is not deployed in Syria, and commanders within it have said they would only
do so on orders from their leadership. Reuters reported earlier this week that
several hundred Iraqi militia fighters had deployed to Syria to help the
government fight rebels who seized Aleppo last week. Golani said the fighting in
Syria would not expand to Iraq and said rebel forces wanted strategic economic
and political relations with Baghdad after overthrowing the current regime.
(This story has been refiled to fix the spelling of Golani in paragraph 3)
Why the Syrian conflict is so important for Russia and Iran
Nathan Rennolds,Rebecca Rommen/Business
Insider/December 5, 2024
Israel launches new airstrikes on Beirut, weighs retaliation against IranScroll
back up to restore default view. Russia carried out airstrikes in Syria after
rebels launched an offensive against the Syrian government. Russia and Iran have
supported Syrian President Bashar Assad for years. Here's why Syria is so
important for both Moscow and Tehran. Russia has been carrying out airstrikes on
Syrian rebel fighters who are advancing through the country as part of an
offensive that has seen them seize control of Aleppo, one of Syria's largest
cities. The surprise offensive, led by Islamist militants from the opposition
group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, marks the most significant escalation in the Syrian
civil war in years — and the outcome has serious implications for both Russia
and Iran.
Russia's gateway to the Mediterranean
Syria holds strategic importance for Moscow and Tehran, which have both
supported Syrian President Bashar Assad's embattled regime. For Russia, which
operates two major military bases in the country — the Hmeimim airbase and the
Tartus naval base — Syria offers a key foothold in the region, giving its forces
crucial access to the Mediterranean Sea and a launching pad for operations in
Africa. Russia has sought to extend its influence across the Middle East and
Africa in recent years as a counterweight to the US, forging closer ties with
key Middle Eastern players like Iran and Saudi Arabia and reportedly providing
African governments with security assistance through the Wagner mercenary group.
Natasha Hall, a senior fellow with the Middle East Program at the Center for
Strategic and International Studies, told Business Insider that Russian
President Vladimir Putin cannot afford to lose a Russia-friendly government in
Syria for fear of losing the airbase and warm water port crucial to maintaining
its influence in the region. "It's used that port and the base as a launching
pad to move into Africa," Hall said. "At one point, there were at least 30
Russian warships in the Mediterranean, whereas just a few years prior, there
were none."Zineb Riboua, a research fellow and program manager at the Hudson
Institute's Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East, said losing Syria
would be "a big deal for Russia.""Most of its plans in the Sahel and Libya
revolve around supporting Russia's access to the Mediterranean, without a strong
Russian military base in Syria, all of Putin's plans collapse," Riboua wrote on
X. Putin's support for Assad helped boost his popularity in Africa, Riboua
continued, adding that losing Syria would "make Putin not just look weak, but
look unreliable to many African countries that rely today on Wagner."
Iran's network of proxies
Syria also provides Iran with access to the Mediterranean via a land corridor
that extends from Tehran through to Baghdad, Damascus, and Beirut, connecting
its proxies in the region. "For Iran, Syria is absolutely essential in order to
maintain its proxy network," Hall said. "It now has this unimpeded route from
Tehran all the way to Lebanon." Syria is particularly important for Iran's
ability to support the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, which for over a year
has been embroiled in conflict with Israel. Israel has recently thrown this top
Iranian ally into disarray, killing its longtime leader and wounding thousands
of its fighters with exploding pagers and walkie-talkies. A cease-fire agreement
was reached between Israel and Hezbollah last week. "Iran is deeply invested in
Syria with dozens of military bases and other facilities because the country is
critical to Tehran's support for Hezbollah," wrote Steven Cook, the Eni Enrico
Mattei senior fellow for Middle East and Africa Studies at the Council on
Foreign Relations think tank. Syria provides Tehran with a place to manufacture
weapons and a route to transport them, as well as a command post for Iranian
commanders who work with Hezbollah, Cook said. But Israeli strikes on the
militant group have impacted Iran's corridor and put its position in the region
under pressure. Tehran may, therefore, see the Syrian conflict as a way to
reimpose itself in the region, Riboua said in another post on X. "Weakened in
Lebanon and Gaza, Iran now views the conflict in Syria as an opportunity to
reassert its influence by joining the Assad regime against its opposition,"
Riboua said. "Tehran likely sees this renewed involvement as a chance to restore
its legitimacy and strengthen its control over its proxies."
Latest conflict is 'no surprise'
Russian ties with Syria trace back to the Cold War era when Moscow supplied arms
to the country. The two countries grew closer under the leadership of Putin and
Assad, as the former sought to expand and defend Russian interests in the Middle
East. In 2015, this resulted in Russia directly intervening in Syria's civil
war, which began in 2011, to prop up Assad. Over the following years, Moscow
steadily built up its military presence in Syria, and by 2018, the Russian
Ministry of Defense said that more than 63,000 Russian troops had "received
combat experience" in the country. But following Russia's full-scale invasion of
Ukraine in February 2022, Moscow's Syrian operations were put on the back
burner, and it reportedly redeployed some troops, mercenaries, and military
equipment from Syria to Ukraine. Iran and Syria, meanwhile, have had strong
relations since the 1979 Iranian revolution. Iranian troops are also reported to
have fought alongside Syrian government forces in 2015. But like Russia, Iran's
priorities have shifted in recent months, with Tehran locked with Israel in a
series of escalating long-range strikes. For the US, that meant the latest
offensive seemingly came as no great shock. Speaking to NBC News, national
security advisor Jake Sullivan said that Assad's three key backers, Iran,
Russia, and Hezbollah, had all "been distracted and weakened by conflicts
elsewhere.""So it's no surprise that you see actors in Syria, including the
rebels, try to take advantage of that," he added. For Russia and Iran, the fall
of Aleppo will nevertheless come as a humiliating blow, Hall said. It shows "how
weak their ally is, even after 13 years of war," she added.
Syrian rebels discover
Assad Speedo photo in Aleppo takeover - report
Jerusalem Post/December 05/2024
The photo was reportedly found inside Assad's Palace in Aleppo, Syria's
second-largest city, which was invaded by Syrian rebels on Sunday. Syrian
rebels, who have advanced into the cities of Aleppo and Hama in recent days,
obtained a photo of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad from his youth in a Speedo,
which was circulated on social media on Thursday. The photo was reportedly found
inside Assad's Palace in Aleppo, Syria's second-largest city, which was invaded
by Syrian rebels on Sunday. Almost the entirety of Aleppo is currently in rebel
hands, except for a few Kurdish neighborhoods in the north of the city that
still remain in SDF (the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces). The Palace was
captured along with the nearby Aleppo Military Academy, during which they
claimed to capture Russian air defense systems.
Yuval Barnea contributed to this report.
UN Food Agency Says Fighting in Syria's Northwest Displaced
More than 280,000 People
Asharq Al Awsat/December 5, 2024
Recent fighting in Syria's northwest has displaced more than 280,000 people, the
United Nations World Food Program said in a post on X on Thursday. This came as
Syrian insurgents entered the central city of Hama Thursday after days of
intense clashes with government forces as they push forward with their week-long
offensive that brought large parts of Syria under their control. The Syrian army
said it has withdrawn from Hama after opposition insurgents broke through its
defenses marking another setback for President Bashar Assad, days after losing
the country's largest city. The Syrian army said it redeployed from Hama and
took positions outside the city to protect the lives of civilians. The
opposition armed group's next target is likely to be the central city of Homs,
the country’s third largest. Homs, which is about 40 kilometers (25 miles) south
of Hama, is the gate to the capital Damascus, Assad's seat of power and the
coastal region that is a base of support for him. Abu Mohammed al-Golani, the de
facto leader of the Syrian insurgency announced in a video message that the
insurgency reached the city of Hama in a “conquering that is not vengeful, but
one of mercy and compassion.”
Syria’s Hama: Key to Controlling Military Operations
Damascus/Asharq Al Awsat/December 5, 2024
Fierce clashes are unfolding in northern Hama, with the Syrian army working to
block opposition groups trying to enter from three directions: Khatab to the
northwest, Maardes to the north, and Maar Shuhur to the northeast.
Hama, located in central Syria, is a key military hub linking the country’s
regions. It is home to vital military sites, including Hama military airport,
weapon depots, army barracks, and the Mechanized Infantry School, as well as the
Military Intelligence Directorate. Hama is politically and symbolically
important, as it is mostly Sunni Muslim. In 1982, the city was the site of the
largest anti-Ba'ath regime protests since the 1960s. The protests were met with
a harsh military response, killing and displacing tens of thousands. This event
remains a key part of the city's history and played a major role in Hama’s
involvement in the 2011 uprising, which was later crushed and turned into an
armed conflict. Although the government controls Hama, the city remains hostile
to pro-regime loyalists, who are mainly confined to government offices. There
are efforts to increase their presence through official events. Hama is one of
the least militarized cities in Syria, with fewer security forces and military
personnel on the streets compared to cities like Damascus and Homs, where they
dominate public spaces.
Local sources told Asharq Al-Awsat that while the community has resisted outside
influence, recent years have seen growing involvement from Iran and Hezbollah
through economic means and warlords.Iran has increased its presence in Hama’s
countryside and tried to spread Shia Islam, taking advantage of local poverty,
but its influence in the city itself has been limited. Hama’s strategic
importance lies in its role as a key supply route between Aleppo, the coast, and
the poor western countryside villages, which have historically supplied recruits
to security forces. It is also connected to the coastal areas, where many senior
officials come from. Militant groups are aiming to capture Hama because it
provides a path to advance into southern Hama and northern Homs.
Taking Homs would allow them to cut off Damascus from the coast and block the M5
highway, which links Damascus, Homs, Hama, and Aleppo. Since the situation
escalated in Aleppo and the militant offensive began, Hama has been under
intense stress and fear. As militants neared the city's outskirts last Saturday,
a de facto curfew took hold, with many displaced people from Aleppo filling the
streets and parks. Dozens are living in cars and on sidewalks, while most
businesses have shut down.
Only bakeries and food shops are open for a few hours to meet the high demand
for supplies.
Syrian Opposition Captures Key City of Hama
Asharq Al Awsat/December 5, 2024
Syrian opposition factions announced capturing the key city of Hama on Thursday,
bringing the insurgents a major victory after a lightning advance across
northern Syria and dealing a new blow to President Bashar al-Assad and his
Russian and Iranian allies.The Syrian army said it was redeploying outside the
city "to preserve civilians lives and prevent urban combat" after what it called
intense clashes. Opposition factions said they were preparing to keep marching
south towards Homs, Syria's great crossroads city that links the capital
Damascus to the north and coast.
"Your time has come," said an opposition operations room in an online post,
calling on city residents to rise up in revolution. Al Jazeera television
broadcast what it said were images of opposition militants inside Hama, some of
them greeting civilians near a roundabout while others drove in military
vehicles and on mopeds. The opposition took the main northern city of Aleppo
last week and have since pushed south from their enclave in northwest Syria.
Fighting has raged around villages outside Hama for two days. The fall of Hama,
which was in government hands throughout the civil war triggered by a 2011
rebellion against Assad, will send shockwaves through Damascus and fears of a
continued rebel march south. Assad relied heavily on Russian and Iranian backing
throughout the most intense years of the conflict, helping him to claw back most
territory and the biggest cities before front lines froze in 2020. The
opposition insurgents have been battling to try to enter Hama since Tuesday and
there was heavy fighting overnight with the Syrian army and allied Iran-backed
militia groups supported by a Russian bombardment, both sides said. Hama is also
critical to the control of two major towns with big minority religious
communities, Muhrada which is home to many Christians and Salamiya where there
are many Ismaili Muslims. The most powerful opposition faction is the Hayat
Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the former al Qaeda affiliate in Syria. Its leader Abu
Mohammed al-Golani has pledged to protect Syria's religious minorities but many
remain fearful of the insurgents. On Wednesday Golani visited Aleppo's historic
citadel, a symbolic moment for the opposition who were driven out of the city in
2016 after months of siege and intense fighting, their biggest defeat of the
war. Aleppo was Syria's biggest city before the war. HTS and the other groups
are trying to consolidate their rule in Aleppo, bringing it under the
administration of the so-called Salvation Government they established in their
northwestern enclave. Aleppo residents have said there are shortages of bread
and fuel, and that telecoms services have also been cut.
'Charred body pieces everywhere' after Israeli strike sets
tents ablaze in Gaza safe zone
CBC/December 5, 2024
Palestinians were digging through burnt debris searching for bodies Thursday
after some 20 people were killed a day earlier in an Israeli strike that set
ablaze tents sheltering displaced families in a designated humanitarian zone in
southern Gaza. Residents carried a body wrapped in carpets out of the charred
wreckage of the makeshift shelters in Al-Mawasi, near the beach west of Khan
Younis, where tens of thousands of people have sheltered in the crowded tent
camp for months. The tent camp was designated a humanitarian zone by Israeli
authorities, who have long told Palestinians to go there for safety.
Mohamed Abu Shahla was sheltering in the tent camp when the strike hit "all of a
sudden and without any warning.""It didn't spare any people or anything," Abu
Shahla told CBC News on Thursday. The strike set several large tents ablaze, and
the fire was worsened by the explosion of cooking gas canisters and the burning
furniture of the displaced people. On Thursday, the area was strewn with charred
clothing, mattresses and other belongings among the twisted frames of scorched
shelters. He said displaced Palestinians were looking for some 15 children
missing following the attack. "You heard the screams of women and children while
they burned … there isn't a single body that's whole. All of them are in
pieces," he said. Children cry as people mourn Palestinians killed in an Israeli
strike at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, on
Thursday. (Mohammed Salem/Reuters)
Majority of victims are women, children: Civil defence . Eyewitnesses said the
strike on the tent camp caused a fireball to erupt. "[Al-]Mawasi is not safe …
nowhere in the Gaza Strip is safe," Ahmad Al-Siqali said. Muhammad Abdul Raouf,
a night director with the volunteer-run Palestinian Civil Defence group, said
the majority of the 20 confirmed killed were women and children. "The place was
scattered with martyrs [when we arrived], charred body pieces everywhere," he
told CBC News Wednesday. Israel said the strike targeted senior Hamas
operatives, whom it did not identify. The aftermath of an Israeli strike
Thursday on a crowded tent camp where thousands of displaced Palestinians were
sheltering. (Mohamed El Saife/CBC) "We don't see anyone from the whole world
standing by us or helping us in this situation. Let them stop this crazy war
that's against us. Let them stop the war," said Abu Kamal Al-Assar, a witness at
the site. At a funeral in Khan Younis, where relatives wept over the
white-shrouded bodies of people killed the day before, resident Abu Anas Mustafa
called the Amnesty report, which accuses Israel of commiting genocide in Gaza,
"a victory for Palestinian diplomacy," although he said it "came late." "It is
the 430th day of the war today, and Israel has been carrying out massacres and a
genocide from the first 10 days of the war," he said.
House in Gaza City destroyed in attack
The attack was one of several others across the Gaza Strip that killed a total
of 39 Palestinians, according to medics. In Gaza City, medics said an attack
destroyed a house where an extended family had taken shelter and damaged two
nearby homes, killing at least three people. The Israeli army says militants
frequently use residential buildings, schools and hospitals for operational
cover. Hamas denies this, accusing Israeli forces of indiscriminate attacks and
ignoring the plight of civilians in harm's way. In Rafah, near the border with
Egypt, an Israeli strike killed three Palestinians on Thursday, medics said.
Three others were killed in a separate airstrike in Shejaia, in eastern Gaza
City, they added. On Thursday, Hussam Abu Safiya, director of Kamal Adwan
Hospital in Beit Lahiya in the north of the enclave, said a 16-year-old boy who
used a wheelchair was killed, and several people, including medics, were wounded
by Israeli drone fire against the medical facility. There was no Israeli comment
on Abu Safiya's account. The health ministry said the three hospitals that are
barely operational on the northern edge of the Gaza Strip have come under
repeated attack since Israeli forces sent tanks to Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun
towns and the nearby Jabalia camp in October. Israel launched its assault on
Gaza after Hamas-led fighters attacked Israeli communities on Oct. 7, 2023,
killing 1,200 people and capturing more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli
tallies. Since then, it has laid much of the Gaza Strip to waste, forcing nearly
the entire population of 2.3 million people from their homes. Authorities in the
Hamas-run territory say more than 44,500 Gazans have been killed, with thousands
of others feared dead under the rubble.
US Says Disagrees with
Amnesty International's Genocide Accusation Against Israel
Asharq Al Awsat/December 5, 2024
The United States disagrees with Amnesty International's conclusion that Israel
has committed genocide against Palestinians in the Gaza war, the State
Department said on Thursday. State Department deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel
told reporters at a regular news briefing that the US continues to find
allegations of genocide in Gaza unfounded, after the London-based Amnesty
International human rights group in a report on Thursday said Israel has
committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. The 1948 Genocide Convention,
enacted in the wake of the mass murder of Jews in the Nazi Holocaust, defines
genocide as "acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a
national, ethnical, racial or religious group.”Israel has consistently rejected
any accusation of genocide, saying it has respected international law and has a
right to defend itself after the cross-border Hamas attack from Gaza on Oct. 7,
2023 that precipitated the war. Israel launched its air and ground war in Gaza
after Hamas-led fighters attacked Israeli communities across the border 14
months ago, killing 1,200 people and taking over 250 hostages back to Gaza,
according to Israeli tallies. Gaza's Health Ministry says that Israel's military
campaign since then has killed more than 44,400 Palestinians and injured many
others. Palestinian and UN officials say there are no safe areas left in Gaza, a
tiny, densely populated and heavily built-up coastal territory. Most of Gaza's
2.3 million people have been internally displaced, some as many as 10 times.
Israel presents Hamas new ceasefire and hostage release
deal
Walla/December 05/2024
An Israeli official noted, "The Egyptian and Qatari mediators believe Hamas
might now agree to a hostage-release and ceasefire deal."Israel has given to
Hamas, through Egyptian mediators, an updated version of a ceasefire deal
proposal that involves the release of the remaining 100 hostages, two Israeli
officials said. Attempting to leverage regional and international
shifts—including the elimination of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar in mid-October,
the ceasefire agreement with Hezbollah in Lebanon, and President-elect Donald
Trump’s inauguration in late January—the updated version of the proposal mirrors
previous similar efforts while emphasizing the implementation of the first phase
of the deal from August. "The Egyptian and Qatari mediators believe Hamas might
now agree to a hostage-release and ceasefire deal, even if it is partial," one
Israeli official noted. Key points of the new proposal were finalized during a
meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, involving senior ministers and
several security chiefs. These points were passed to Egyptian intelligence, who
then presented them to Hamas representatives in Cairo. "Egypt is currently the
primary negotiation channel with Hamas, although Qatar is also involved,"
Israeli officials stated. The new proposal offers a ceasefire with Hamas lasting
42 to 60 days. During this period, the Gazan terror organization would release
female hostages, male hostages over 50, and hostages in critical medical
condition. Israel, which initially demanded the release of 33 individuals in
these groups, has adjusted its expectations, citing assessments that some
hostages may no longer be alive. Notably, the proposal maintains Israel's
readiness to release hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, including those serving
life sentences, in exchange.
Israel awaits Hamas response
"We are waiting for the Egyptians to inform us of Hamas's response,” an Israeli
official remarked concerning Hamas’s stance on the updated proposal. “Within a
few days, we will know whether Hamas is willing to negotiate within the
framework we presented or not," he added. If Hamas responds positively, an
Israeli delegation will travel to Cairo to finalize details such as the
ceasefire duration, the number of hostages to be released, and which Palestinian
prisoners will be freed. In Washington, Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer
met with President-elect Donald Trump’s National Security Advisor Mike Waltz.
"The President-elect supports a deal for the release of hostages and a ceasefire
in the Gaza Strip, provided it is acceptable to Israel." a Trump advisor said,
adding, "Trump wants such a deal to move forward quickly, without delay, and
before January 20." Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al
Thani told Sky News that he is in contact with Trump’s advisors on the matter.
"We have heard from Trump’s advisors that he wants the hostage issue and the
Gaza ceasefire resolved before he takes office. We hope both sides understand
this message," he said.
Israel FM says ‘may have
opportunity’ for Gaza hostage deal
AFP/December 05, 2024
JERUSALEM: Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said Thursday that Israel may have “an
opportunity now” to secure a deal for the release of its hostages held by
Palestinian militants in Gaza. Speaking in a video message from a meeting in
Malta, he said: “We may have an opportunity now for a hostage deal. Israel is
serious about reaching a hostage deal and I hope we can do this and do it as
soon as possible.”
Palestinian security forces exchange gunfire with militants
in West Bank
AFP/December 06, 2024
JENIN: Gunfights erupted in Jenin in the north of the occupied West Bank on
Thursday between militants and Palestinian security forces following the theft
of vehicles belonging to the Palestinian Authority, according to AFP journalists
in the city. The intense exchanges of fire began around 9:30 PM (1930 GMT) and
followed the deployment of members of the security forces around the Jenin
refugee camp, which is adjacent to the city and a stronghold for armed groups in
the territory, according to the journalist. Witnesses reported that the
Palestinian security forces set up roadblocks on routes leaving the camp.
Tensions were running high in Jenin earlier in the day after a group of armed
men seized two vehicles belonging to the PA and paraded through the streets
waving Islamic Jihad flags. In a statement, General Anwar Rajab, spokesman for
the security forces, said “a group of outlaws opened fire on the headquarters of
the security services” and stole two vehicles. He said the security forces would
“recover the vehicles and hold accountable anyone who committed this
act.”Tensions between the PA and armed groups appear to have been exacerbated by
recent arrests by the security forces. At a press conference inside Jenin camp,
Mahmud Abu Talal, spokesman for a collective of local armed groups, said the PA
had “abandoned its people in the most difficult circumstances.” He rejected the
label of outlaws and accused the PA of “carrying out a continuous operation to
undermine those who protect their people.”Jenin has long been a bastion of
Palestinian armed groups and was the focus of a major Israeli raid launched at
the end of August. Violence in the West Bank, already increasing, surged after
the start of the war in Gaza in October 2023. Israel has occupied the territory
since 1967.
Ex-Shin Bet chief: Netanyahu asked me to spy on ministers,
officers
Jerusalem Post/December 05/2024
Cohen said he saw the request not as eavesdropping but rather as “using tools
against anyone who is privy to the secret, including wiretapping.”Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu asked former Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) chief Yoram
Cohen to eavesdrop on ministers and senior officers who were involved in a major
security event, Cohen revealed on Thursday.The allegations stem from a 2018
incident and are reportedly connected to MK Benny Gantz, who was serving as the
IDF chief of staff at the time. Cohen emphasized that he saw the prime
minister’s request to spy on Israeli officials not as eavesdropping but rather
as “using tools against anyone who is privy to the secret, including
wiretapping.” Cohen emphasized that conspiracies arise when “a lack of public
awareness” is combined with “consciousness engineering.” He connected this to
October 7, 2023, asserting that “people close to Netanyahu” are actively shaping
a narrative suggesting that the “failure on October 7th was entirely the
military’s fault.” These two statements, that the prime minister had requested
the Shin Bet to eavesdrop on high-ranking Israeli security officials and that
people close to Netanyahu were allegedly working on “engineering” Israeli
consciousness, follow further earlier remarks made by the former Shin Bet chief
the day before. Gantz's and Netanyahu's reactions. National Unity Party leader
Benny Gantz responded to the comments by Cohen, saying, "For over 40 years, I
have served—and continue to serve—Israel's security in the most sensitive roles.
The good of the state and its security have always been my top priority. Those
who know me understand that, unlike Netanyahu, I never leak state secrets, even
when my position is not accepted. There were such cases during the current
conflict while I was a member of the war cabinet."
Gantz further stated, "The fact that Netanyahu asked the Shin Bet Chief to break
the law and use tools intended for our enemies against the heads of security
branches does not surprise me—neither then nor now. It says more about him and
the criminal culture that surrounds him." The prime minister's office later
responded to Cohen's comments. "Yoram Cohen, who is pretending to be naive and
is deeply entrenched in a political campaign, is trying to fabricate yet another
'manufactured scandal.' The Prime Minister acted to protect a vital state
secret, followed legal recommendations, acted according to the law, and did not
infringe on anyone's rights." "Contrary to Cohen’s statements, the real threat
to democracy in Israel does not come from elected officials but from elements
within the law enforcement authorities who refuse to accept the will of the
voters and are attempting to carry out a governmental coup through unrestrained
political investigations that are unacceptable in any democracy," the statement
added.
Cohen criticizes ultra-Orthodox draft policy
During a Zionist Right conference at the Begin Center in Jerusalem on Wednesday,
aimed at halting the ultra-Orthodox draft law, Cohen noted, “If there were a
possibility for the Zionist Israeli government to negotiate with the
ultra-Orthodox, for them to serve the State of Israel out of their own free
will, that would be preferable.” However, he said that he doesn’t think the
ultra-Orthodox community would wish to serve in the army. He then emphasized
that in such a case, Israel could possibly “adopt the approach of establishing a
government that can decide on this matter and impose sanctions, which will also
include employment.”Cohen also stressed that, in his opinion, “Arabs should also
serve” in the army. He also expressed his steadfast stance concerning the
establishment of a Palestinian state, saying, “There must be a clear and
definite ‘no’ to the establishment of a Palestinian state. This possibility is
unrealistic, unachievable, and must not be allowed. This was also true before
October 7.”Regarding the possibility of joining politics, he responded, “I
haven’t decided on this yet, but I’m not ruling out entering politics.” “Yoram
Cohen, who is deep in a political campaign, is trying to create another
fabricated ‘scandal,’” the PMO stated. The prime minister sought to protect
vital state secrets, followed the legal recommendations, acted according to the
law, and did not infringe upon anyone’s rights.”“Contrary to Cohen’s statements,
the real threat to democracy in Israel is not from elected officials but from
law enforcement authorities who refuse to accept the will of the voters and are
trying to carry out a political coup through unrestrained political
investigations, which are unacceptable in any democracy.”
Israeli court rejects
Netanyahu’s request to limit how often he’ll testify
AP/December 05, 2024
JERUSALEM: An Israeli court on Thursday rejected a request from Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu to limit the number of days each week he’ll have to testify
when he finally takes the the stand in his years-long corruption trial.
Netanyahu’s lawyers have made numerous requests to delay his testimony, which is
expected to begin next Tuesday and last several weeks. His lawyers had requested
that he testify fewer than three days a week, because of the demands of dealing
with the Mideast wars and the fighting in the Gaza Strip and Lebanon. Jerusalem
district court judges ruled on Thursday that they “found no compelling reason”
to allow the request. Netanyahu is charged with fraud, breach of trust and
accepting bribes in three separate scandals in which he is accused of trading
favors with powerful media moguls and wealthy associates. He denies wrongdoing.
Cyprus takes delivery of Israeli air defense system, report says
Reuters/Jerusalem Post/December 05/2024
Efforts are underway to upgrade Cyrpus's "anti-aircraft umbrella," the source
said. Cyprus has taken delivery of an Israeli air defense system, local media
reported on Thursday, as the east Mediterranean island taps new markets to
upgrade its defense capabilities after the loss of key supplier Russia. TV
station Sigma said the first deliveries were made on Tuesday. Cypriot officials
declined to comment on the specifics of the report. "The only thing I can say is
we will and are doing everything necessary to bolster the deterrence force of
Cyprus, not only because we are a country under occupation, but an EU member
state in a region of particular geo-strategic importance," Cypriot President
Nikos Christodoulides told reporters on Thursday. Cyprus was split in a Turkish
invasion in 1974, with the internationally recognized government controlling the
south and a breakaway heavily militarised Turkish Cypriot state in the north.
The Barak MX anti-aircraft system will complement and eventually replace the
older Russian-made Tor M1. Russia has been a leading supplier of military
hardware to Cyprus for decades, but deals tapered off even before a blanket ban
on exports in the wake of Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Those sanctions
have left Cyprus's existing defense systems short of spare parts, and they
cannot be upgraded, a senior Cypriot source told Reuters. "That is why Cyprus is
turning to other countries of the European Union, as well as Israel. As part of
that, efforts are underway to upgrade our anti-aircraft umbrella," the source
said.
Cypriot officials never openly disclose procurement programs because of ongoing
tensions with Turkey. An attempt by Cyprus to upgrade its anti-aircraft umbrella
in 1998 with surface-to-air S-300 missiles from Russia culminated in a military
standoff with Turkey, and Nicosia hurriedly diverted the system to Crete. That
acquisition was not supported by either Britain or the US at the time, though
relations with Washington have improved markedly in recent years as Cyprus has
anchored its policy firmly to the West.
Nobel Laureate Narges Mohammadi granted short medical leave from prison in Iran
Media Line Staff/December 05/2024
Her husband, Taghi Rahmani, who resides in France with their children,
criticized authorities for delaying necessary medical care. Jailed Iranian
activist and 2023 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Narges Mohammadi has been granted a
21-day medical leave to recover from surgery, her foundation announced
Wednesday. Mohammadi, 52, underwent surgery to remove a potentially cancerous
lesion from her leg and requires extended care, though her foundation argues the
leave is insufficient for proper recovery. For more stories from The Media Line
go to themedialine.org “A 21-day suspension of Narges Mohammadi’s sentence is
inadequate,” her foundation said in a statement, calling for at least three
months outside prison. Mohammadi has been serving her sentence in Tehran’s Evin
prison since November 2021, following her conviction for “spreading anti-state
propaganda.” Her husband, Taghi Rahmani, who resides in France with their
children, criticized authorities for delaying necessary medical care. “She needs
to stay out of prison to receive adequate medical care,” Rahmani told The New
York Times. Mohammadi’s health has deteriorated during her incarceration, with
reports of multiple heart attacks, according to her foundation. Despite her
imprisonment, Mohammadi has become an enduring symbol of female resistance in
Iran. Her involvement in the 2022 anti-government protests, sparked by the death
of Mahsa Amini, led to her receiving the Nobel Peace Prize, which her children
accepted in her absence. Protests in Iran. The protests, known as the “Women,
Life, Freedom” movement, challenged Iran’s mandatory hijab laws and systemic
oppression. Footage shared by her foundation showed Mohammadi returning home
after her surgery, her leg in a cast, dressed in a sleeveless floral gown
without a hijab. She declared, “Freedom is our right. Long live freedom! Women,
life, and freedom!”
Satellite images show
Iran's new drone carrier has set sail, leaving its home port for the first time
Jake Epstein/Business Insider/December 05/2024
A container ship that Iran has spent the past few years turning into a
militarized drone carrier has left its home port for the first time, recent
satellite imagery obtained by Business Insider shows. In an image captured on
November 12 by BlackSky, which provides space-based real-time intelligence, the
new Shahid Bagheri can be seen at an Iranian shipyard located along the Persian
Gulf. But an image captured a little more than two weeks later, on November 28,
shows the Bagheri missing from its berth at the Iran Shipbuilding & Offshore
Industries Complex, just west of the southern port city of Bandar Abbas.
Open-source intelligence gathered by H I Sutton, an independent defense analyst,
suggests that the Bagheri left the port to begin sea trials off Iran's coast.
It's unclear if these are still ongoing. When asked to comment on the situation,
a US defense official said the military does not provide assessments on
adversary capabilities or actions. The Bagheri started as a container ship known
as the Perarin, but in 2021, Iran began working on the vessel to transform it
into a functional drone carrier for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps
Navy.At nearly 790 feet long, the Bagheri somewhat resembles a Soviet aircraft
carrier with a distinctive ski-jump ramp, which was added in 2023. The ship's
angled flight deck, used for launching and recovering drones, measures just
under 600 feet. It's unclear what type of drones — or how many — might be
included in the Bagheri's future carrier air wing. It could consist of a mix of
one-way attack uncrewed aerial vehicles, in addition to reconnaissance and
strike platforms that can return to the after their missions are completed.
Nadimi said that the Bagheri will increase Iran's flexibility by allowing it to
carry out long-range surveillance and strike missions and recover the drones
used. In turn, Tehran can invest more in developing more sophisticated and
larger systems that won't just be used for one-way attack operations. The
Bagheri isn't the only container ship that the Iranians have turned into a
military vessel. Last year, the IRGCN commissioned the Shahid Mahdavi, a
modified expeditionary sea base that was formerly known as the Sarvin. This
vessel can carry helicopters, drones, special forces units, and missiles.
Earlier this year, the Mahdavi completed a weekslong deployment in the Indian
Ocean. During this voyage, it sailed near a key US base on the island of Diego
Garcia in what appeared to be a demonstration of Tehran's reach to the American
military. Nadimi said that the IRGCN's push to convert merchant ships into sea
bases and drone carriers reflects its desire to engage in longer-range
operations farther from Iran, possibly in an attempt to mirror the US Navy
aircraft carriers that regularly deploy to the region. The capabilities of the
Bagheri and Mahdavi don't come close to those of the American carriers, which
can launch and recover advanced fighter jets and travel with smaller but
powerful warships. However, the Iranian vessels could still have an impact in an
asymmetrical naval warfare role, especially if they're armed with missiles,
helicopters, and drones. The Middle East has seen a sharp increase in
unconventional naval warfare in recent years, ranging from Iranian harassment of
commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz to the missile attacks on Red Sea
shipping lanes carried out by Tehran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen. Heavily
armed drone carriers like the Bagheri could allow Iran to engage in this kind of
warfare at greater distances rather than being constrained to its neighborhood
or having to rely on proxy forces. "They should be considered a threat not only
to sea lines of communication and freedom of shipping and things like that but
also to coastal and inland facilities and infrastructure as well," Nadimi said.
Blinken, Russia's Lavrov
clash on Ukraine at a security meeting in Malta
VALLETTA, Malta (AP)/December 05/2024
— Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov clashed Thursday indirectly with U.S.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken at an annual security meeting, accusing the
West of risking escalation over Ukraine but walking out before Blinken and other
speakers could respond. Speaking at the Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe ministerial meeting in Malta, Lavrov accused the West of
reviving the Cold War and provoking a direct conflict with Russia. He said the
U.S. actions were driven by a desire to “return NATO to the political
spotlight.” “After the Afghan disgrace, there was a need for a new common
enemy,” Lavrov said during his first stop in an EU nation since Russia's
full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. “The result is the
reincarnation of the Cold War, but now with the far greater risk of its
escalation into the hot phase.”Blinken, who spoke after Lavrov left the room,
put the blame for escalation in the region back on Russia, noting that the
Russian foreign minister, the fourth speaker, did not stick around to listen to
other speakers. "Let’s talk about escalation,'' Blinken said, citing the
deployment of North Korean forces in Europe, the use of an intermediate-range
ballistic missile to attack Ukraine, Russia's move to lower the threshold for
the use of nuclear weapons, and attacks on Ukraine's energy infrastructure. “Mr.
Lavrov spoke about the sovereign right of every member-state to make their own
choices,'' Blinken said. ”That’s exactly what this is about: the sovereign right
of Ukraine and the Ukrainian people to make their own choices about the future,
not to have those choices made in and by Moscow."Ukraine's Foreign Minister
Andrii Sybiha, who was the first to address the panel, walked out as Lavrov took
the podium, along with the foreign ministers of Poland and Estonia. Before
leaving the podium, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister, Andrii Sybiha, called his
Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov a “war criminal.”“Ukraine continues to fight
for its right to exist. And the Russian war criminal at this table (Lavrov)
should know this: Ukraine will succeed and justice will prevail.”The visit
marked Lavrov’s first visit to an EU member nation since the start of the
Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. It has been relatively rare for
Lavrov to attend forums involving senior Western officials, although he recently
took part in the United Nations General Assembly and the G20 summit in Brazil.
Russia's Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said on her message app
that Malta had annulled her visa to accompany Lavrov. The Maltese foreign
affairs office said that three OSCE member countries had objected to extending
the visa to Zakharova, who is under a travel ban. Lavrov is subject to EU
sanctions, but faces no travel ban. Lavrov attended the event last year in
Skopje, North Macedonia, but Poland denied him a visa the previous year in the
wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Blinken traveled to Malta from Brussels,
where he attended what was likely to be his last NATO meeting of the outgoing
Biden administration. Ukraine’s foreign minister was also attending, after
Ukraine boycotted last year over Lavrov’s attendance. Reporters Without Borders
called on the OSCE to release 38 journalists detained by Russia, including 19
Ukrainians arrested in illegally occupied territories. It said in a statement
that Russia is the world’s fifth-largest jailer of journalists.
The Latest English LCCC analysis & editorials from miscellaneous
sources
on December 05-06/2024
On Siding with No One!
Hazem Saghieh/Asharq Al Awsat/December 05/2024
When it comes to the Arab Levant, it is difficult to take a sentence in a single
direction or have it convey a single emotion. The immense relief at Lebanese
Hezbollah being weakened is born coupled with fury at the Israeli war machine’s
crimes against the people of Lebanon, particularly the Shiites, as well as
anxiety over what the war could mean for the southern border, and more than
anything else, fear for the future of civic peace and the prospect of Lebanon’s
foundations, as a society and a state, breaking down. We could say something
similar about what happened in Aleppo and western Syria, in light of the
regime’s exhaustion, which had been exposed, even before the regime's complete
silence since October 7, by a long series of Israeli airstrikes. We thus end up
with a situation that engenders two sentiments side by side:
On one hand, we rejoice at the status quo established by Russia's (aerial) and
Iran’s (ground) intervention years ago being deeply shaken, as well as the
return of hundreds of thousands of refugees and displaced persons who had been
forced out by the violence of the regime and its allies, and the release of
prisoners of conscience (not all prisoners).
On the other hand, we panic about the prospect of Islamist forces "filling the
vacuum"- forces known for their primitivism, fanaticism, and medieval positions
on minorities, women, and education...If there is indeed a "Turkish scenario"
behind the events, with influential regional and international powers colluding
with Ankara, then our horror broadens to encompass the fate of the Kurdish
minority there and in their other areas to the east. Attacks against them began
with ferocity early on, and the same might also happen to other minorities in
what could be a kind of rambling tragedy. Assuming that the Iranian influence is
being rooted out of the region, if the aim, in Iraq, is to have the Popular
Mobilization Forces become a substitute for Hezbollah in the assault on the
Syrian people, we would find the same pairing of sentiments: cries of glee at
the fates that could befall the militias of de facto control that would be
accompanied by sorrow at the sectarian militias opposing them, who share their
backwardness and fanaticism, taking their place. Dozens of examples that evoke
these dual stances and feelings could be given, as there are no forces whose
actions could safeguard states and national communities and maintain an
acceptable degree of stability, respect for the rule of law, and openness to the
world.
After over half a century of an oppressive, factional, and genocidal military
regime’s rule, along with the cultural and moral ossification of all aspects of
life, faith, and education that comes with it, the Levant now constitutes a sick
and diseased space from which politics has withdrawn, with kinship, sectarian,
tribal, and ethnic loyalties that share an authoritarian bent competing over
power. It seems, however, that the eventual failure of three major
events/developments, albeit of divergent significance and impact, has done more
than anything else to deplete vigorous and promising forces, leaving us almost
fated to misery
In 2003, the overthrow of Saddam Hussein did not give rise to a unified Iraq in
which political life could absorb the drive for vengeance and curb sectarian and
ethnic loyalties or tame them. The political elite, who rushed to broaden
foreign influence at the expense of national sovereignty, played a decisive role
in reinforcing and perpetuating this state of affairs. In 2005, Lebanon’s
"second independence" was prevented from becoming a prelude to the development
of a modern political society capable of transcending sectarianism. To that end,
a culture rife with kinship loyalties colluded with a series of assassinations,
and the instigation of the 2006 war which thwarted any effort to ensure reform
and change.
The biggest disaster came with the defeat of the Syrian revolution, a little
over a year after it broke out in 2011, as it devolved into a civil war. Modern
forces that pursued peaceful civic change could not withstand the onslaught of a
brutal regime from one side and insular Islamic militias from the other. Due to
Syria's geographical centrality, the revolution's defeat opened the floodgates
to the spread of decay throughout the Levant, not just in Syria, and that was
even before the progressive agenda was hit with the disaster of “Al-Aqsa Flood”
and the same old bland questions imposing themselves.
Having missed these three major opportunities, the Levant, amid the cascading
collapses in Libya, Yemen, and Sudan, has become little more than a home for the
"Game of Nations,” where foreign forces and local militias loyal to them hold
power. While all maps seem like they could be gone with the wind, every scene
revolves nowadays around a community shelling another community and masses of
people wandering aimlessly in hunger, fear, and horror. Thus, we are left with
nothing more than a political drought and a barren landscape. This demands some
humility and that we return to the fundamental questions: What is a country?
What is citizenship? What is the state? What is politics? Where does one begin?
With such questions, we can reconnect with a history frozen by a combination of
tyrannical repression and intellectual and cultural stagnation. As for the
constellation of armed forces, whether they are allied or in conflict, none of
us win with the victors nor lose with the vanquished.
UN’s diplomatic failure: Why the two-state solution won’t bring peace to Israel
– editorial
Jerusalem Post/December 05/2024
The UN’s two-state solution rhetoric fails to address Palestinian terrorism and
Israel’s security needs.‘Insanity is doing the same thing repeatedly and
expecting different results,” Albert Einstein once allegedly stated. And as we
approach 2025, here we go again.The United Nations General Assembly announced it
will host a June conference to discuss the two-state solution, a decades-old
proposal for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. UNGA President Philémon Yang
announced the initiative with grandiose rhetoric, urging both parties to
recommit to negotiations and a peaceful resolution.
“After more than a year of war and suffering, realizing this vision is more
urgent than ever before,” Yang said. He described the ongoing denial of
Palestinian statehood as a perpetrator of violence and despair, effectively
giving carte blanche to Palestinian violence against Israelis – comments that
echo what UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres stated last October, merely
weeks after Hamas terrorists crossed Israel’s border and raped, mutilated,
murdered and kidnapped over 1,000 civilians, including women and children, and
soldiers. “It is important also to recognize the attacks by Hamas did not happen
in a vacuum,” Guterres famously said.Yang claimed the two-state solution ensures
Palestinian self-determination while safeguarding Israel’s security.
But the announcement, while dressed in the language of hope, reeks of hollow
moral grandstanding that ignores the realities on the ground and the UN’s
culpability in perpetuating this conflict. The two-state solution, long the UN’s
focus, consistently fails due to Palestinian leadership’s refusal to recognize
Israel and ongoing corruption and incitement. Instead of addressing these
issues, the UN has acted as an enabler. Sticking to the status quo
The truth is stark: the two-state solution has become a diplomatic euphemism for
maintaining the status quo. While Yang stressed dialogue, he conspicuously omits
any serious critique of the Palestinian Authority’s kleptocratic governance or
Hamas’s terrorist regime in Gaza. No state should be expected to negotiate under
fire, yet Israel is routinely pressured to do so as rockets fall on its cities
and its citizens are slaughtered. Yang’s comments praising the Palestinian
struggle and decrying Israeli actions betray a glaring bias. While he stresses
the importance of dialogue, he omits the fact that Israel has faced unrelenting
attacks. The UNGA’s tendency to vilify Israel while excusing Palestinian
extremism makes any serious discussion about peace a farce.
Reut Shapir Ben Naftaly, representing Israel on Tuesday, also called out the
hypocrisy, stating that in the coming week, the Assembly would host three
meetings focused on the Middle East, centered on resolutions that exhibit a
“blatant disregard for the truth.” She emphasized that, following October 7, the
UN’s deeply entrenched anti-Israel bias has been glaringly exposed.
Yang’s remarks, with their selective moral outrage, ignore the hundred-plus
Israeli hostages still held in Gaza whose plight has been sidelined in global
discourse. It seems the UN’s commitment to human rights skips over Israeli
victims when crafting its narratives. The planned June conference will likely
follow the UN’s usual script: a parade of resolutions condemning Israel,
sanctimonious speeches, and no real accountability for Palestinian leadership or
their terrorist proxies. If the UN truly wanted to contribute to peace, it would
focus on dismantling terror networks, ensuring that aid reaches civilians
instead of fueling violence, and genuinely supporting Israel’s right to
security. The hypocrisy surrounding this upcoming conference is particularly
apparent when considering recent history. As the UN decries Israel, it continues
to fund entities and initiatives in Palestinian territories with little
oversight, allowing resources to be siphoned into terror infrastructure (UNRWA
anyone?). The result? Billions in aid funneled into a society where martyrdom is
celebrated, and peace is an afterthought. Meanwhile, Israel is expected to
negotiate with a partner that not only denies its right to exist but actively
seeks its destruction. The UN was founded on the principle of safeguarding peace
and protecting human rights. But its treatment of Israel underscores how far it
has strayed from these ideals. The June conference is a charade, a testament to
the UN’s irrelevance in achieving peace in the Middle East. The organization has
shown that it lacks both the will and the credibility to address the conflict.
Israel, meanwhile, will continue to fight for its survival.
The Race for Nuclear Fusion Energy, the Clean Fuel of
the Future: Will China Eat America's Lunch?
Lawrence Kadish/Gatestone Institute./December 05/2024
China, with at least three tokamak fusion reactors, is speeding along to win the
clean nuclear energy race – and its lucrative markets.
The clean energy breakthrough everyone has been wishing for finally is here! It
may not be quite ready for prime time, but a quiet nuclear-fusion energy race is
underway and cannot come soon enough.
The problem is that China seems to be winning it, not the United States or the
West.
It is nuclear fusion -- making atoms collide, rather than splitting them, or
fission -- when two atoms are forced to combine into one new atom at extremely
hot temperatures. "In order for fusion to occur on the very hot gas -- or
plasma," notes euro-fusion.org, "the plasma must be heated to temperatures in
excess of 150 million degrees Celsius [320 million degrees F]. " The sun does it
without a container -- their combined new weight comes to less than each atom
had separately.
This differential becomes a burst of energy that leaves no nuclear residue while
functioning as if one had in one's car a gallon of gas which could run it for 20
years. Fusion energy produced four times the power of fission energy, and when
harnessed could be used as fuel for expeditions into outer space. Soon we shall
presumably be able to say goodbye to expensive, combustible, warm-weather-only
and not-very-far lithium batteries, and instead travel unpollutingly along on
tiny bundles of captured energy.
The good news is that nuclear fusion, which is produced through nuclear
reactors, tokamaks, leaves absolutely no residue.
The bad news is that -- apart from needing further development and affordability
-- the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) seems already to be working at warp-speed
to develop this new form of energy for commercial and other use. China's regime
has reportedly allocated $1.5 billion annually to this effort, which would
appear hardly enough, but is still nearly twice as much as the US is investing.
The CCP, moreover, has also reportedly been able to remove the most major
drawback: a troublesome resin that impeded the fusion by lowering the
temperature needed in the reactor, an impediment that was possibly overcome last
month by changing the fuels and using the magnetic fields inside the tokamak --
"the device that uses magnetic fields to confine a plasma" -- to divert the
plasma into a chamber the shape of a "cored apple."
In the US, entrepreneurs such as Elon Musk at Tesla and Sam Altman, CEO of
OpenAI (the parent company of ChatGPT), have also been in this race to harness
nuclear-fusion energy. Tesla bought SolarCity in 2006, originally to explore
energy storage, but apparently also produce nuclear fusion energy. Altman took a
nuclear energy company public for $500 million. One of his companies reportedly
"has already secured a permit from the Department of Energy to build its first
microreactor at the Idaho National Laboratory."
Meanwhile, other entrepreneurs have been exploring hydrogen-generated energy. At
least for now, however, it seems that the method is carbon-intensive and
converting the hydrogen into energy might still require more energy than it can
produce.
Meanwhile, China, with at least three tokamak reactors, is speeding along to win
the clean nuclear energy race – and its lucrative markets:
"China's Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) fusion reactor on
28 May achieved another world record by maintaining a plasma temperature at 120
million decrees Celsius for 101 seconds and at 160 million Celsius for 20
seconds, a major step toward the test run of the fusion reactor. EAST is located
at the Hefei Institutes of Physical Science of the Chinese Academy of Science (ASIPP)
in Hefei. It is one of three major domestic tokamaks now in operation in China."
It is intensely to be hoped that the incoming administration will not allow
China to eat America's lunch.
**Lawrence Kadish serves on the Board of Governors of Gatestone Institute.
© 2024 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.
France’s ambassador sparks
outrage with support for Persian hegemony in Armenia – opinion
Mordechai Kedar/Jerusalem Post/December 05/2024
Diplomatic posts from French ambassador highlight growing Paris-Tehran ties amid
regional tensions. French Ambassador to Armenia Olivier Decottignies recently
published two social media posts about the Blue Mosque in Yerevan, where he
wrote the following caption: “In the gardens of the Blue Mosque of Yerevan,
emblematic of Armenia’s Persian heritage.” The second photo is even more absurd.
The diplomat copied an illustration of a map of Iran with the province of West
Azerbaijan highlighted in red, proclaiming: “One of the 31 provinces of Iran,
whose capital and largest city is Urmia.”The Azerbaijanis are outraged by these
social media posts, as the Blue Mosque in Yerevan was built by Azerbaijanis, and
trying to portray the mosque as “Persian” demonstrates France’s support for
Persian colonialism in the region.
Furthermore, the Azerbaijanis are angered at the French diplomat’s attempt to
portray West Azerbaijan as part of Iran. In the 1980s, present-day Armenia had a
sizable population of over 250,000 ethnic Azerbaijanis, who were forcefully
expelled from the region between 1987 and 1988. Following their deportation, the
Armenians did everything in their power to erase all traces of Azerbaijani
heritage from their country. Expansion in the South Caucasus
One of these efforts was to refer to historic Azerbaijani mosques, such as the
Blue Mosque in Yerevan, as “Persian” mosques. Armenia did this because it enjoys
a positive relationship with Iran but is in open conflict with Azerbaijan.
The Persians gladly accepted these efforts and used these Armenian acts of
delegitimization in order to expand their colonial influence into the South
Caucasus. The French diplomat not only highlighted this in his posts but
expanded upon it by denying the Azerbaijani connection to Urmia, the largest
city in the West Azerbaijan province of Iran and its capital city.
In the eyes of many, these social media posts highlight France’s open support
for Persian hegemony in the region, in violation of the West’s interest to fight
against the pro-Iranian axis, which presently spreads from Tehran to Lebanon,
Gaza, Syria, Iraq, and Yemen. It is critical to recall that French President
Emmanuel Macron called for Western countries to stop delivering weapons to
Israel, two days before the anniversary of the October 7 terror attacks. The
fact that Macron is an open critic of Israel while at the same time deploying an
ambassador who so openly posts on social media in favor of Tehran makes one
pause to ponder – where do Paris’s interests truly lie?
“Just as Iran supports all parts of the Iranian terror axis, so are Israel’s
friends expected to support Israel and not impose restrictions that will only
strengthen the Iranian axis of evil,” Netanyahu told Macron about a month ago.
However, in May, France banned Israel from participating in Eurosatory, an
international arms show held outside of Paris. A French court overturned that
decision, but the legal ruling did not come in time for Israeli companies to
participate in the exhibition. This, together with Decottignies’s social media
posts, shows where France’s sympathies truly lie. This comes amid Moscow’s
diminishing influence in Armenia, a gap that is increasingly being filled by
Iran, thus enabling Persian hegemony to expand in the region while Hezbollah is
losing ground in Lebanon and Hamas is suffering severe losses in Gaza. Tehran
moving into Yerevan to replace the Russian influence over Armenia has enabled
the Iranian axis to stand strong against Western-imposed sanctions despite the
defeats they suffered in Gaza and Lebanon. For this reason, France’s support for
Persian hegemony in Armenia further aids the Iranian axis at a time when
everyone in Israel seeks to see Iran’s influence get weaker; this is bad news
from an Israeli standpoint. The time has come for Paris to stand firm against
Tehran, rather than aiding and abetting Israel’s enemies in Iran and their
proxies, Hezbollah, Hamas, the Islamic Jihad, and the Houthis.
The writer is a Middle East scholar and commentator on the region.
Christians in Aleppo: A current situation report
Edy Cohen/Israel Today/December 05/2024
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/2024/12/137612/
Israel Today correspondent Dr. Edy Cohen on the current developments and
background to the situation of Christians in Aleppo.
The exodus of Christians from Syria continues even as local rebel groups make
new progress against the regime. In the past 10 years, some two-thirds of
Syria’s Christian population has fled. While Christians made up about 10 percent
of the population in 2011, estimates today put that number at just two percent.
In contrast to other minorities in Syria such as Druze, Kurds, and Alawites, the
number of Christians has fallen from 1.2 million to about 350,000 today – and
there is no end in sight. Christians are leaving the Middle East. This trend is
continuing not only in Syria, but also in Iraq and Lebanon. The main reasons are
the poor economic situation and the lack of personal security. Many leave
seeking security and economic stability in European countries.
Before the civil war, Aleppo was the city with the third largest Christian
population in the Middle East after Cairo and Beirut. In Aleppo there are around
30 churches of all Christian denominations: Greek Orthodox, Armenian, Maronite,
Assyrian, Protestant, and others. The brutal and surprising attack on Aleppo by
Islamist groups under the banner of “Fatah al-Sham” a few days ago has brought
back memories that Christians will never forget, when ISIS and other jihadists
occupied and destroyed churches. The expulsion of Christians and Yazidis in
2014, the religious persecution by Islamists, and of course the mass murders of
Christians and other minorities, especially in Iraq but also in Syria, are
unforgettable. The destruction of churches and Christian cemeteries was
documented in detail at the time.
Those today taking control in Aleppo are essentially the same jihadists that
previously conquered the city. They are mostly all former ISIS terrorists. After
the defeat of ISIS, its fighters split into several factions that formed
alliances with one another. This is how the “new ISIS” de facto came into being.
Here are the names of the organizations that are now grouped under the euphemism
“rebels” or “Syrian opposition”:
Turkish jihadists
Ansar al-Islam
Caucasian Emirate
Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula
Islamic Front
Jabhat al-Nusra
Jabhat Fath al-Sham
Jabhat Ansar al-Din
All of these groups, as mentioned, have joined together to form the “Committee
for the Liberation of the Levant.” They are Sunni-Salafist organizations.
Invasion and occupation
Over the past several days since the new offensive began, no exceptional
incidents against Christians have so far been recorded, with the exception of an
incident against a Christmas tree in Aleppo on the first day of the new
occupation. Apart from this incident, no exceptional incidents against
Christians or entities associated with Christianity have been reported in the
city.
At the same time, however, other incidents against Syria’s Kurdish minority
occurred: Ethnic cleansing in two Kurdish neighborhoods of Aleppo, Sheikh
Maqsoud and al-Ashrafiyah. The Kurds were forced to leave these neighborhoods.
Tens of thousands of Kurds have left Aleppo and are now living in tents in areas
controlled by Kurdish militias. Thousands of houses have been cleared out and it
is unclear what has happened to Kurdish property.
Back to the Christians
The Islamist groups that have taken over Aleppo want to conquer all of Syria. It
is no secret that their ultimate goal is to overthrow the Assad regime and gain
complete control of all of the country. These groups seek to first take all of
Aleppo, then the city of Hama, then Homs and finally Damascus, to make the final
battle for President Bashar al-Assad’s palace. However, their strategy is
different from that of ISIS before them. These groups have been waiting for this
offensive for almost a decade. The weakening of Iran and Hezbollah on the
Lebanese front acted as a catalyst. In their new strategy, these groups have
decided to behave respectfully toward the Christians for now, to show the free
world that they are a worthy alternative to Assad’s rule. The Islamist groups
are experienced and this time they are trying to prove that they do not
represent “radical Islam,” despite the documented atrocities they have committed
in recent days against Kurds and regime soldiers. They consider these two groups
to be legitimate targets–the soldiers because they belong to a corrupt regime,
and the Kurds because they are allies of the Jews.
Despite these changes, there is no doubt that Christians in Aleppo live a life
of fear. Three weeks before Christmas, there are no signs of the upcoming
festival, and there will probably be no decorations or Christmas trees. Even if
Christian churches are not destroyed, people do not go out on the streets
without their heads covered. Christian life under a radical Islamist regime that
wants to re-establish the Islamic caliphate is not an option. Every Christian
will choose to leave the city, especially women. In time, and it won’t be long,
Muslim men will abduct, marry, and even forcibly convert Christian women. A
bleak future hangs over the Christian community in Aleppo, even if it is not
presently under pressure.
New packaging, old content
Only a few years ago, the whole world was fighting in an international coalition
against ISIS, mainly because of its crimes against humanity. Today, Islamist
groups have realized that they must change course and demonstrate tolerance in
order to gain legitimacy, or at least not be fought by overwhelming Western
forces. This is the new strategy of these organizations. But the videos that
have been circulating in recent days prove beyond doubt that they are committing
war crimes: shooting and mistreating prisoners, expelling Kurds, and many other
crimes against humanity. All this proves that nothing good can be expected from
these groups. Under the regime of Bashar al-Assad, minorities enjoy the
protection of the authorities. It is not pleasant to praise Assad, but it must
be said: under Assad, Christians are much better off than under those Islamist
factions who consider Bashar’s rule heretical because he belongs to the Alawite
community.
From the first day of the occupation of Aleppo, Islamist groups tried to show
that they would not harm Christians and would allow them to celebrate their
festivals. There are two videos: a clearly-staged propaganda video describing
the relationship with Christians and another propaganda video produced by the
factions to prove that they are at peace with Christians.
Explanation: A staged propaganda video shows a young man being woken up by the
Islamist groups filming him. He begins by greeting them in an Islamic manner
(“In the name of Allah, the Gracious, the Merciful”). Then, throughout the
video, he repeatedly says his name: George (Christian) from Aleppo. He thanks
the groups and says that everything is fine and repeats his name again
(stressing that he is a Christian, since the groups do not harm Christians). He
continues: “I woke up free, nobody bothered me, my name is George, I went to the
toilet and nobody bothered me – everything is fine.” Throughout the video, the
young man emphasizes that his name is George Elias, an obviously Christian name,
from Aleppo.
Explanation: A journalist with links to Islamist groups interviews a Christian
boy and girl named Miriam. The journalist begins by saying that he is standing
next to young people decorating a Christmas tree (supposedly conducting a random
interview without prior arrangement). The journalist asks the boy: “Is anyone
bothering you?” The answer: “Nobody bothers us, nobody bothers us.” (Supposedly,
they lead a normal life in the shadow of the holidays.) The journalist asks
Miriam questions about Christmas and again the same question: “Is anyone
bothering you?” Miriam answers: “No, no.” The girl mentions that she is afraid
of the bombings (which are only carried out by Assad’s army and the Russians).
Despite the propaganda portrayal that Islamist groups allow Christians in Aleppo
to live a normal and safe life, the reality for Christians remains one of fear
and insecurity while living under the control of radical factions that aim to
establish an Islamic caliphate in the long term. The apparent tolerance serves
primarily to gain international legitimacy, while the actual crimes against
minorities and opponents of the groups, such as ethnic cleansing and war crimes
against the Kurds, continue behind the scenes. The decorated Christmas tree and
staged interviews cannot conceal the dire situation of the Christian community.
Facing a Historic Test
Hanna Saleh/Asharq Al Awsat/December 05/2024
Lebanon is facing a historic test after having been dragged into a perilous war
against its will. Lebanese blood was spilled, infrastructure was destroyed, and
tens of thousands of families were displaced for long periods. The enemy has
erased border towns, depriving residents of shelter.
All the Lebanese deserve a safe and stable life, and they are facing a historic
test to reclaim their hijacked state, retrieve its power to make decisions, and
reinforce sovereignty. This challenge revolves around the ceasefire that began
on November 27, albeit with Israeli violations. The agreement affirms "the
cessation of hostilities... and the enhancement of security arrangements toward
the implementation of Security Council Resolution 1701" with the aim of
achieving "a sustainable end to the current escalation of hostilities across the
Blue Line and are each prepared to take steps to promote conditions for a
permanent and comprehensive solution.”Negotiated by Lebanon’s permanent Speaker
of Parliament Nabih Berri, who agreed to it on behalf of Hezbollah, the
agreement calls for the "disarmament of all armed groups in Lebanon" in its
preamble, identifies the forces allowed to bear arms, and calls for dismantling
of military structures across the country, starting from south of the Litani
River. The ceasefire ushers in an era in which Lebanon has a bidding obligation
to bid farewell to illegitimate arms. In practice, "Chapter VII" now applies in
Resolution 1701, with international powers overseeing the implementation
mechanism, which is under the control of CENTCOM. This new era comes after
decades where citizens had been made into victims since the "revolution" of
1958, through to the era of "Fatah Land" and the civil war, Israeli and Syrian
occupation, and Iranian hegemony through Hezbollah, which play a crucial role in
the defense strategy of the Iranian regime! The new state of affairs leaves no
room for ploys, and reinforcing the ceasefire must take precedence over all
other priorities. Israel's serious violations, which show that the enemy's
appetite for killing and destruction remains unchecked, demand that the Lebanese
strictly implement Resolution 1701. This resolution is seen as an insurance
policy for restoring the state that, in turn, protects everyone by restoring
stability and taking Lebanon on a journey toward recovery that closes the
chapter of vacancies at the upper echelons of power and social fragmentation. It
also demands that the era of taking decision-making hostage to the "blocking
third" that facilitated the party's transformation into a transnational force be
ended, which led to the current conflict.
There is no place for sly maneuvers by Hezbollah. Any attempt to maintain its
status, regardless of the justifications, will be rejected. The narrative of "we
protect and build," which has left Lebanon with burdens it cannot carry, has
fallen apart. The arsenal outside the state's control failed to protect those
who held it, bringing destruction instead. Beyond the lives lost, priceless
memories, places, neighborhoods, homes, and livelihoods have been eradicated.
The 60-day truce is an opportunity for Hezbollah to conduct a serious
reassessment of its political and military behavior and take the decision the
people are demanding: to abandon its arms.
The remnants of the government and the political class must also reexamine their
actions, as everyone, albeit to varying degrees, bears responsibility for
covering up the hijacking of the state and the country becoming easy prey to the
enemy.
The decision to delay the parliamentary call to elect a president until January
9 is alarming: we have seen the implosion of the situation in northern Syria,
which could have repercussions for Lebanon, and several calamities have hit the
country. Indeed, under these circumstances, the delay reflects the authorities’
disregard for the people suffering, the overwhelming majority of Lebanese
citizens. This delay, which passed without objection, is concerning because it
signals, at the very least, that the president is beholden to sectarian forces.
That would mean tasking him with reshaping the authorities to suit the interests
of those responsible for the era of systematic plunder that impoverished the
country and its people, seized justice, and brought citizens to their knees. At
most, it signals the intent of the "sectarian duo" to elect a president that
meets Hezbollah's conditions, allowing the party to regain the initiative and
continue to control Lebanon. In this context, the lack of transparency regarding
the content of the agreement seems very suspicious. It is unacceptable that the
state’s narrative about the agreement seems to limit its scope to south of the
Litani River... And those returning to their villages found ashes and pressure
by the enemy to perpetuate displacement due to the neglect of this priority.
While the implementation mechanism of the UN resolution places responsibility on
the Lebanese government, the country currently has no government. It cannot be
formed until after a president is elected. This situation may have negative
implications, undermining political cover for the army, which has been made
responsible for restoring stability, peace, and security. Lebanon has never been
in this situation at any point in its history. This phase presents an
opportunity to rebuild the republic and extend its sovereignty without partners.
Accordingly, Lebanon deserves a president of a different caliber- someone who
understands the deep-seated pain and its causes and who has a reformist vision
that allows him to form a competent government that is not sullied by the
sectarian-quotas power-sharing regime.
Such a government would restore domestic confidence in and global respect for
the state, which could introduce a period of durable solutions during which
institutions are reestablished on sound grounds that accelerate the country's
recovery. This recovery should begin with a transparent accountability process,
and this duty must not be neglected. To that end, it is time for Lebanese
citizens to reclaim their role as political actors, fostering a mass awakening
that could lead to reformation and genuine authorities through early
parliamentary elections. These elections must ensure proper representation,
especially after the catastrophic performance of the current parliament, which
has refused even to discuss the war that destroyed Lebanon for 14 months.