Shops shut and streets empty as Lebanon enters strictest COVID-19 lockdown

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Updated 14 January 2021
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Shops shut and streets empty as Lebanon enters strictest COVID-19 lockdown

  • Virus patients struggling to breathe wait outside hospitals — hoping for a bed or a even chair to open up
  • The surge in coronavirus cases began in late August, a few weeks after the massive explosion at Beirut port

BEIRUT: It was a choice between containing a spiraling virus outbreak and resuscitating a dying economy in a country that has been in steady financial and economic meltdown over the past year. Authorities in Lebanon chose the latter.
Now, virus patients struggling to breathe wait outside hospitals — hoping for a bed or a even chair to open up. Ordinary people share contact lists of oxygen suppliers on social media as the the critical gas becomes scarce, and the sound of ambulances ferrying the ill echoes through Beirut. Around 500 of Lebanon’s 14,000 doctors have left the crisis-ridden country in recent months, according to the Order of Physicians, putting a further strain on existing hospital staff.
On Thursday, Lebanese authorities swung the other way: They began enforcing an 11-day nationwide shutdown and round-the-clock curfew, hoping to blunt the spread of coronavirus infections spinning out of control after the holiday period.
The curfew is the strictest measure Lebanon has taken since the start of the pandemic.
Previous shutdowns had laxer rules and were poorly enforced. Now, residents cannot leave their homes, except for a defined set of reasons, including going to the bakery, pharmacy, doctor’s office, hospital or airport — and for the first time they must request a permit before doing these things. Even supermarkets can only open for delivery.
While Lebanon still somehow managed to keep cases to an average of fewer than 100 per day until August, it now leads the Arab world in number of cases per million people. Today, the number of daily COVID-19 deaths is more than 13 times what it was in July. On Jan. 9, over 5,400 infections were reported, a record for the small country.

While its neighbors begin vaccinating their populations — including Israel whose campaign promises to be among the world’s speediest — Lebanon has yet to secure a first batch of shots. Once a leader in the health sector among Middle Eastern countries, Lebanon has been stymied in its effort to get vaccines by repeated bureaucratic delays partly due to the fact that it has a caretaker government.
Parliament is expected to meet Friday to vote on a draft law to allow importing the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, with the first deliveries expected to arrive next month.
“This is the result of deliberate decisions made by irresponsible and immoral politicians,” said Sami Hanna, a 42-year-old businessman who was waiting for his turn to enter a pharmacy earlier this week, looking for pain relievers, anti-depressants and blood pressure medicine for his elderly parents.
“This is how we spend our days now, begging,” he said, adding that his next mission was to look for bread, which was out of stock because of panic-buying before the curfew set in. “It is too little too late.”
The surge in coronavirus cases began in late August, a few weeks after the massive explosion at Beirut port that destroyed parts of the capital, including several hospitals with virus patients.
The explosion was caused by a fire that detonated nearly three tons of poorly stored ammonium nitrate that had been sitting in a port warehouse for years — the kind of mismanagement that is typical of a corrupt political class that fails to provide even basic services for its people.
The virus surged in the chaos of inundated hospitals, funerals and protests that followed.
Further complicating efforts to rein in the virus, politicians have been unable to agree on a new government since the old one resigned in the wake of the port explosion, effectively ensuring the country’s continued unraveling.
But in December, as most governments around the world tightened lockdowns, Lebanon went the other way, allowing restaurants and nightclubs to reopen with barely any restrictions in place. An estimated 80,000 expats flowed to the country to celebrate Christmas and New Year with loved ones — many of them Lebanese who skipped visiting in the summer because of the devastation wrought by the explosion.
“The holiday season should have been the time for lockdown. The season of crowds, shopping and parties,” said Hanna Azar, owner of a money transfer and telephones shop. “They opened it to allow dollars into the country and now they want to close. Especially in this economic crisis, people don’t have money to eat.”
Many hospitals have now reached maximum capacity for coronavirus patients. Some have run out of beds, oxygen tanks and ventilators. Others have halted elective surgeries.
Last week, Lebanon imposed a 25-day nationwide lockdown and a nighttime curfew to limit the spread of the virus, but many sectors were exempted and enforcement was lax, as in the past. Many businesses, including hair salons, welcomed customers behind shuttered storefronts. In some areas of north and south Lebanon, it was business as usual.
With hospitals on the brink of collapse, the government then ordered an 11-day nationwide curfew starting Thursday, triggering three days of mayhem as crowds of shoppers emptied shelves in supermarkets and bakeries.
On Thursday, police manned checkpoints around the country, checking motorists’ permission to be on the road.
Halim Shebaya, a political analyst, said the government still has no clear strategy and cautioned that it would be difficult to bring the numbers down this late in the game.
“The main issue now is the absence of trust in the government and authorities and managing a pandemic necessitates the presence of public trust in measures taken by the authorities,” he said.
Still, Rabih Torbay, who heads Project HOPE, an international global health and humanitarian organization, said time is of essence and urged authorities to take any step that might help curb infections.
“Every day that goes by the country is sliding further into the abyss,” he said.

 

 


Jordan’s king says Israel’s resumption of Gaza attacks a ‘dangerous step’

Updated 19 March 2025
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Jordan’s king says Israel’s resumption of Gaza attacks a ‘dangerous step’

PARIS: Jordan’s King Abdullah called on Tuesday for the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas militants in Gaza to be restored and for aid flows to resume.
“Israel’s resumption of attacks on Gaza is an extremely dangerous step that adds further devastation to an already dire humanitarian situation,” he said, standing next to French President Emmanuel Macron in Paris.

Gaza health ministry says one dead among foreign UN staff injured in Israeli strike

Updated 32 min 52 sec ago
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Gaza health ministry says one dead among foreign UN staff injured in Israeli strike

GAZA: The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said that a foreign UN worker was killed and five others seriously injured Wednesday by an Israeli strike on their headquarters.
A statement from the health ministry said there was “one death and five severe injuries among foreign staff working for UN institutions... due to the bombing of their headquarters by the occupation in the central governorate a short while ago,” adding they had been taken to the Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital.

AFP has not been able to confirm the information with the UN.

Israel's army, however, denied striking the UN building in Gaza.

“Contrary to reports, the IDF (army) did not strike a UN compound in Deir el-Balah,” the army said in a statement, while an army spokesperson told AFP: “I confirm there was no IDF operational activity there and that the IDF didn't strike the UN compound.”


Hamas says open to talks as Israel keeps up Gaza strikes

Updated 19 March 2025
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Hamas says open to talks as Israel keeps up Gaza strikes

  • Hamas is open to talks on getting the ceasefire back on track but will not renegotiate the agreement that took effect on January 19
  • Negotiations have stalled over how to proceed with a ceasefire whose first phase expired in early March

GAZA CITY: Hamas said it remained open to negotiations while calling for pressure on Israel Wednesday to implement a Gaza truce after its deadliest bombing since the fragile ceasefire began in January.
Israel carried out fresh air strikes on Gaza on Wednesday, killing 13 people according to the territory’s civil defense agency, after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday’s raids were “only the beginning.”
The United Nations and countries around the world condemned the high civilian death toll in the renewed strikes, which have killed more than 400 people, according to Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.
Hamas is open to talks on getting the ceasefire back on track but will not renegotiate the agreement that took effect on January 19, an official from the militant group said.
“Hamas has not closed the door on negotiations but we insist there is no need for new agreements,” Taher Al-Nunu told AFP.
“We have no conditions, but we demand that the occupation be compelled to immediately halt its aggression and war of extermination, and begin the second phase of negotiations.”
Negotiations have stalled over how to proceed with a ceasefire whose first phase expired in early March, with Israel and Hamas disagreeing on whether to move to a new phase intended to bring the war to an end.
Instead, Israel and the United States have sought to change the terms of the deal by extending stage one.
That would delay the start of phase two, which was meant to establish a lasting ceasefire and an Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, and was swiftly rejected by Hamas, which demanded full implementation of the original deal.
“There is no need for new agreements in light of the existing agreement signed by all parties,” Nunu said.


Israel and the United States have portrayed Hamas’s rejection of an extended stage one as a refusal to release more Israeli hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.
Netanyahu’s office said he ordered the renewed strikes on Gaza after “Hamas’s repeated refusal to release our hostages.”
In a televised address late Tuesday, the premier said: “From now on, negotiations will take place only under fire... Military pressure is essential for the release of additional hostages.
“Hamas has already felt the strength of our arm in the past 24 hours. And I want to promise you — and them — this is only the beginning.”
The White House said Israel consulted US President Donald Trump’s administration before launching the strikes, while Israel said the return to fighting was “fully coordinated” with Washington.
The intense Israeli bombardment sent a stream of new casualties to the few hospitals still functioning in Gaza and triggered fears of a return to full-blown war after two months of relative calm.
The roads were once again filled with Palestinian civilians on the move as families responded to evacuation warnings from the Israeli army.
“Today I felt that Gaza is a real hell,” said Jihan Nahhal, a 43-year-old from Gaza City, adding some of her relatives were wounded or killed in the strikes.
“Suddenly there were huge explosions, as if it were the first day of the war.”
The Gaza health ministry said the bodies of 413 people had been received by hospitals, adding people were still under the rubble.
A spokeswoman for the UN children’s agency UNICEF said medical facilities that “have already been decimated” by the war were now “overwhelmed.”


Governments in the Middle East, Europe and beyond called for the renewed hostilities to end.
German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said Israel’s raids on Gaza “are shattering the tangible hopes of so many Israelis and Palestinians of an end to suffering on all sides.”
European Union foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said she told her Israeli counterpart Gideon Saar that the new strikes on Gaza were “unacceptable.”
Both Egypt and Qatar, which brokered the Gaza ceasefire alongside the United States, condemned Israel’s resort to military action.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi said the strikes were part of “deliberate efforts to make the Gaza Strip uninhabitable and force the Palestinians into displacement.”
Trump has floated a proposal to move Palestinians out of Gaza, an idea rejected by Palestinians and governments in the region and beyond, but embraced by some Israeli politicians.
Israel’s resumption of military operations in Gaza, after it already halted all humanitarian aid deliveries to Gaza this month, drew an immediate political dividend for Netanyahu.
The far-right Otzma Yehudit party, which quit his ruling coalition in January in protest at the Gaza ceasefire, rejoined its ranks with its firebrand leader Itamar Ben Gvir again becoming national security minister.
The war began with Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, which resulted in 1,218 deaths, mostly civilians, according to Israeli figures.
Israel’s retaliation in Gaza has killed at least 48,577 people, also mostly civilians, according to figures from the territory’s health ministry.
Of the 251 hostages seized during the attack, 58 are still in Gaza, including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.


Trump meets UAE national security adviser, discusses strategic partnership prospects

Updated 19 March 2025
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Trump meets UAE national security adviser, discusses strategic partnership prospects

  • Sheikh Tahnoon is on an official visit to the US where he will meet with senior US administration officials and business leaders

DUBAI: UAE National Security Adviser Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al-Nahyan met with US President Donald Trump at the White House on Wednesday in the presence of senior US officials.

“Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed and the US President discussed opportunities to strengthen the long-term strategic partnership between the UAE and the US and explored ways to enhance it to serve their shared interests,” the state run WAM news agency reported.

Sheikh Tahnoon is on an official visit to the US where he will meet with senior US administration officials and business leaders.

During his meeting with Trump, Tahnoon affirmed the UAE’s commitment to strengthening economic ties with the US by expanding partnerships.

Sheikh Tahnoon also met with US National Security Adviser Michael Waltz and discussed ways to advance bilateral relations and the latest developments on matters of mutual interest.


Iraq makes rare seizure of ship suspected of fuel smuggling in Gulf

Updated 19 March 2025
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Iraq makes rare seizure of ship suspected of fuel smuggling in Gulf

BAGHDAD: Iraqi naval forces have seized an unidentified ship in Iraqi territorial waters in the Gulf suspected of smuggling fuel, the naval forces said in a statement.
Fuel smuggling is common in Gulf waters, where heavily subsidised fuel from some countries is sold on the black market to buyers across the region, though it is relatively rare for Iraqi authorities to seize ships.
A naval patrol boat intercepted the ship on Tuesday after receiving intelligence about suspected illegal activity, according to the navy statement issued late on Tuesday.
The navy said an Iranian captain, eight Indian nationals, and two Iraqi crew members were onboard the ship.
The navy released a picture of the ship, in which no name was visible. It gave no further details about the vessel.
The ship was towed to Umm Qasr naval base for further investigation, and the crew has been handed over to the local police, the navy said.