AMMAN: Jordanian and Emirati officials on Tuesday emphasized the importance of cooperation to address issues related to the Palestinian cause.
Saqr Ghobash, speaker of the UAE Federal National Council, received Ahmed Safadi, the speaker of the House of Representatives — the lower house of the Jordanian parliament — and his accompanying delegation in Abu Dhabi, Jordan News Agency reported.
The meeting in Abu Dhabi came as a follow-up to their previous meeting on Feb. 16 in Amman.
In discussions focusing on Gaza and the West Bank, Safadi reiterated Jordan’s firm stance on ending Israel’s war and occupation on Palestine and promptly delivering humanitarian aid to affected civilians.
He stressed the importance of establishing a Palestinian state as a foundation for lasting peace and highlighted Jordan's role in safeguarding holy sites in Jerusalem.
Safadi also advocated for strengthening economic relations between the two countries and noted the UAE’s significant progress in achieving that goal.
Ghobash recognized Jordan’s contribution to the UAE’s development and lauded the strong bilateral ties between the two nations, especially in their efforts to address the Palestinian issue.
Jordanian, Emirati officials discuss parliamentary cooperation to support Palestine
https://arab.news/g2hy5
Jordanian, Emirati officials discuss parliamentary cooperation to support Palestine
- Safadi reiterated Jordan’s firm stance on ending Israel’s war and occupation on Palestine
Israel says killed Hezbollah militant in Lebanon strike
JERUSALEM: The Israeli military said it carried out an air strike in southern Lebanon on Tuesday that killed a senior Hezbollah militant who was reportedly responsible for a drone and rocket arsenal.
“Earlier today, the IAF (air force) conducted a precise intelligence-based strike in the area of Nabatiyeh in southern Lebanon, eliminating Hassan Abbas Ezzedine, the head of Hezbollah’s aerial array in the Bader regional unit,” the military said in a statement.
The Israeli military said it carried out an air strike in southern Lebanon on Tuesday that killed a senior Hezbollah militant who was reportedly responsible for a drone and rocket arsenal. (AFP/File)
Israel says to release five Lebanese detainees
- “In coordination with the United States and as a gesture to Lebanon’s new president, Israel has agreed to release five Lebanese detainees,” Netanyahu’s office said
- “During the meeting, it was agreed to establish three joint working groups aimed at stabilising the region“
JUREUSALEM: Israel said on Tuesday that it had agreed to release five Lebanese citizens detained during its war with Hezbollah as a goodwill gesture to the neighboring country’s new president.
“In coordination with the United States and as a gesture to Lebanon’s new president, Israel has agreed to release five Lebanese detainees,” a statement from the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said.
Netanyahu’s office said that the decision came following a meeting held earlier in the day in the Lebanese border town of Naqoura that included representatives of the Israeli army, the United States, France and Lebanon.
“During the meeting, it was agreed to establish three joint working groups aimed at stabilising the region,” the prime minister’s statement said.
“These groups will focus on the five points controlled by Israel in southern Lebanon, discussions on the Blue Line and remaining disputed areas, and the issue of Lebanese detainees held by Israel.”
The Blue Line is the UN-patrolled demarcation line that has marked the Israel-Lebanon border since 2000.
In an interview to Lebanese news channel Al Jadeed, US deputy special envoy for the Middle East Morgan Ortagus said the five Lebanese prisoners were a mix of civilians and soldiers.
“I’ll let the government of Lebanon make the announcement of who is in the mix. But there are some soldiers and civilians in the mix of five,” she said.
On November 27, Israel and Lebanon agreed to a US-French mediated truce that largely halted more than a year of hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel, including two months of full-blown war in which Israel sent in ground troops.
While the ceasefire continues to hold, Israel has periodically carried out air strikes on Lebanese territory, it says to prevent Hezbollah from rearming or returning to the territory along its northern border.
On Saturday, the military targeted a Hezbollah militant with an air strike in southern Lebanon. Lebanese media reported one killed and another wounded in what it said was an Israeli drone strike on a car.
The ceasefire required Hezbollah to withdraw north of the Litani River, about 30 kilometers (20 miles) from the border, and to dismantle any remaining military infrastructure in the south.
Israel had been due to withdraw completely from Lebanese territory by February 18 after missing a January deadline, but decided to keep troops at five locations it deemed strategic.
HRW says Syria must protect civilians after ‘killing spree’
- “Grave abuses on a staggering scale are being reported against predominantly Alawite Syrians,” said HRW’s deputy regional director Adam Coogle
- “Government action to protect civilians and prosecute perpetrators of indiscriminate shootings, summary executions, and other grave crimes must be swift and unequivocal”
BEIRUT: Human Rights Watch on Tuesday called on the Syrian Arab Republic’s new authorities to ensure accountability for the mass killings of hundreds of civilians in recent days in the coastal heartland of the Alawite minority.
Violence broke out Thursday as security forces clashed with gunmen loyal to former president Bashar Assad, who is Alawite, in areas along the Mediterranean coast.
Since then, war monitor the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said security forces and allied groups had killed at least 1,093 civilians, the vast majority Alawites.
“Syria’s new leaders promised to break with the horrors of the past, but grave abuses on a staggering scale are being reported against predominantly Alawite Syrians in the coastal region and elsewhere in Syria,” said HRW’s deputy regional director Adam Coogle.
“Government action to protect civilians and prosecute perpetrators of indiscriminate shootings, summary executions, and other grave crimes must be swift and unequivocal,” he said in a statement decrying the “coastal killing spree.”
The New York-based rights group said it was “not able to verify the number of civilians killed or displaced, but obituaries circulating on Facebook indicate hundreds were killed, including entire families.”
The wave of violence is the worst since forces led by the Islamist group Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) launched a lightning offensive that toppled Assad on December 8, capping a 13-year civil war.
Syria’s interim President Ahmed Al-Sharaa, who led HTS, has vowed to “hold accountable, firmly and without leniency, anyone who was involved in the bloodshed of civilians.”
The defense ministry announced on Monday the end of the “military operation” seeking to root out “regime remnants” in the coastal areas.
But according to the Britain-based Observatory, another 120 civilians have been killed since then, the majority of them in Latakia and Tartus provinces on the coast — where much of the earlier violence since last week had occurred.
Authorities have announced the arrest of at least two fighters seen in videos killing civilians, the official news agency SANA reported.
HRW said that “accountability for atrocities must include all parties,” including groups like HTS and the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army that “now constitute Syria’s new security forces.”
“These groups have a well-documented history of human rights abuses and violations of international law,” it added.
HTS, which has its roots in the Syrian branch of jihadist network Al-Qaeda, is still proscribed as a terrorist organization by several governments including the United States.
Since toppling Assad and taking power, Sharaa has vowed to protect Syria’s religious and ethnic minorities.
In its statement, HRW called on the authorities to “fully cooperate with and ensure unhindered access to independent monitors.”
Syria’s presidency had announced that an “independent committee” was formed to investigate the killings.
The panel is due to hold its first press conference later Tuesday.
Uganda says it has deployed troops in South Sudan capital
- A Ugandan military spokesperson said the deployment was at the request of the South Sudan government
- Tensions have risen in recent days in South Sudan
NAIROBI: Uganda has deployed special forces in South Sudan’s capital Juba to “secure it,” Uganda’s military chief said on Tuesday, as tensions between South Sudan’s president and first vice president stoke fears of a return to civil war.
A Ugandan military spokesperson said the deployment was at the request of the South Sudan government.
Tensions have risen in recent days in South Sudan, an oil producer, since President Salva Kiir’s government detained two ministers and several senior military officials allied with First Vice President Riek Machar.
One minister has since been released.
The arrests in Juba and deadly clashes around the northern town of Nasir are widely seen as jeopardizing a 2018 peace deal that ended a five-year civil war between forces loyal to Kiir and Machar in which nearly 400,000 people were killed.
“As of 2 days ago, our Special Forces units entered Juba to secure it,” Uganda’s military chief, Muhoozi Kainerugaba, said in a series of posts on the X platform overnight into Tuesday.
“We the UPDF (Ugandan military), only recognize one President of South Sudan, H.E. Salva Kiir ... any move against him is a declaration of war against Uganda,” he said in one of the posts.
Felix Kulayigye, the spokesperson for the Ugandan military, said the troops were there with permission from the South Sudan government.
“Yes we did (deploy them) and they are there on the invitation of government of South Sudan. The situation will determine how long we’ll stay there,” he said.
He declined to give details of troop numbers.
South Sudan government information minister and the military spokesperson did not respond to calls seeking comment.
After the civil war erupted in South Sudan in 2013, Uganda deployed its troops in Juba to bolster Kiir’s forces against Machar. They were eventually withdrawn in 2015.
Ugandan troops were again deployed in Juba in 2016 after fighting reignited between the two sides but they were also eventually withdrawn.
Uganda fears a full-blown conflagration in its northern neighbor could send waves of refugees across the border and potentially create instability.
Syrian fact-finding committee for sectarian killings says no one above the law
DAMASCUS: A Syrian fact-finding committee investigating sectarian killings during clashes between the army and loyalists of Bashar Assad said on Tuesday that no one was above the law and it would seek the arrest and prosecution of any perpetrators.
Pressure has been growing on Syria’s Islamist-led government to investigate after reports by witnesses and a war monitor of the killing of hundreds of civilians in villages where the majority of the population are members of the ousted president’s Alawite sect.
“No one is above the law, the committee will relay all the results to the entity that launched it, the presidency, and the judiciary,” the committee’s spokesperson Yasser Farhan said in a televised press conference.
The committee was preparing lists of witnesses to interview and potential perpetrators, and would refer any suspects with sufficient evidence against them to the judiciary, Farhan added.
The UN human rights office said entire families including women and children were killed in the coastal region as part of a series of sectarian killings by the army against an insurgency by Assad loyalists.
Syria’s interim president Ahmed Al-Sharaa told Reuters in an interview on Monday that he could not yet say whether forces from Syria’s defense ministry — which has incorporated former rebel factions under one structure — were involved in the sectarian killings.
Asked whether the committee would seek international help to document violations, Farhan said it was “open” to cooperation but would prefer using its own national mechanisms.
The violence began to spiral on Thursday, when the authorities said their forces in the coastal region came under attack from fighters aligned with the ousted Assad regime.
The Sunni Islamist-led government poured reinforcements into the area to crush what it described as a deadly, well-planned and premeditated assault by remnants of the Assad government.
But Sharaa acknowledged to Reuters that some armed groups had entered without prior coordination with the defense ministry.
