The little airline that could — Lebanon’s national carrier braves Israeli airstrikes

The little airline that could — Lebanon’s national carrier braves Israeli airstrikes
A Lebanese Middle East Airlines (MEA) plane takes off from Beirut-Rafic Hariri International Airport as smoke billows in Beirut on Oct. 22, 2024. (Reuters)
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Updated 22 October 2024
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The little airline that could — Lebanon’s national carrier braves Israeli airstrikes

The little airline that could — Lebanon’s national carrier braves Israeli airstrikes
  • Middle East Airlines is the only commercial airline still operating out of the Beirut airport
  • Capt. Mohammed Aziz said the airline has received assurances that Israel won’t target its planes or the airport as long as they are used solely for civilian purposes

BEIRUT: Since Israel began bombarding Beirut’s southern suburbs as part of its offensive against the Hezbollah militant group, Lebanon’s national air carrier has become a local icon simply by continuing to do its job.
Middle East Airlines is the only commercial airline still operating out of the Beirut airport, located on the coast next to the densely-populated suburbs where many of Hezbollah’s operations are based.
Unlike the bruising monthlong war between Israel and Hezbollah in 2006, in which an Israeli strike almost immediately took Lebanon’s only commercial airport out of commission, it has not been targeted in the current conflict.
Capt. Mohammed Aziz, adviser to MEA chairman Mohamad El-Hout, said the airline has received assurances that Israel won’t target its planes or the airport as long as they are used solely for civilian purposes. The carrier conducts a risk assessment each day to determine if it’s safe to fly, he said.
“As long as you see us operating, it means our threat assessment says that we can operate,” Aziz said. “We will never jeopardize the life of anyone.”
Still, the sight of jetliners rising and descending as fire and clouds of smoke blacken the Beirut skyline can be alarming.
Some of the most dramatic images making the rounds on social media depicting jets landing in fiery hellscapes have been AI-generated. And, Aziz said, the plumes of smoke that appear in news footage are often farther away from the airport than they appear.
Still, some strikes have landed too close for comfort. On Monday night, one hit the coastal area of Ouzai, about 200 meters (650 feet) from one of the runways. There were no planes in the area at the time.
Since the escalation began, many embassies have chartered extra commercial flights to get their citizens out. Other flights have carried Lebanese citizens to nearby destinations like Turkiye and Cyprus to wait out the conflict.
The number of daily MEA flights ranges from 32 to 40 — not much below the usual number for this time of year, Aziz said. The difference: now the flights usually depart Beirut full and return two-thirds or three-quarters empty.
While many Lebanese have fled, others continue to fly in and out for business or family reasons.
Elie Obeid, a business consultant, was scheduled to fly to Brussels this month for a seminar. After his original flight on Turkish Airlines was canceled, he booked on MEA.
As his return flight was landing Saturday, heavy airstrikes were underway in the surrounding area. Onboard, Obeid was unaware of what was happening until the plane landed and he opened his phone to a barrage of messages.
He said he had mixed feelings about the experience.
“I do appreciate the fact that they are still flying, since that’s our only connection with the outer world currently,” he said. “But at the same time it is very risky. We should have been told that strikes were happening, and maybe even they could have told the pilot to request to land in Cyprus for a while until the strikes ended.”
John Cox, a US-based former airline pilot who is now an aviation-safety consultant, said when there’s a potential threat, it’s the captain’s call whether or not to proceed, and it’s not unusual for passengers to be left in the dark.
Telling them about a threat they can’t control “doesn’t really do any good, and it stresses them out. So, I would be very hesitant to do that,” he said.
But, he added, “I’m not sure that I want to fly into an area of open conflict like that with passengers on board.”
It is “pretty unusual,” Cox said, for a commercial airline to decide that operating in an active war zone is an “acceptable level of risk.”
“When you’re in an area with ongoing military operations there’s an awful lot of variables,” he said. “Even just keeping the airplanes ... so that they’re not in the same airspace at the same time, that becomes very difficult.”
Aziz said the airline is in “continuous coordination” with the Lebanese government and security agencies, and attempts to mitigate the risk by spacing out flights so the airport is not too crowded at any given time. About 20 percent of its fleet is parked outside of Lebanon to reduce potential damage.
They have also taken measures to adjust for the frequent GPS jamming that is used by Israel to ward off missile and drone attacks but also disrupts civilian navigation technology.
Other airlines have different considerations, Aziz said. Their trips to Lebanon might be “one flight out of 200 or 300 flights per day, so spending two or three hours a day just to make a risk assessment for one flight is a waste of time for them,” he said.
“But for us it’s a necessity, because if we don’t do it we’ll stop operation completely.”
He added, “It’s our duty, of course, to maintain this link between Lebanon and the outside world.”
For many, having that link is a comfort — even if the journey might be harrowing.
Marie-Jose Daoud, editor-in-chief of an online journalism platform, flew to Cyprus with her parents a few days after the massive strike in Beirut’s southern suburbs that killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.
As they were waiting for their flight, she saw on the news that the Israeli military had issued evacuation notices for two areas close to the airport. Soon after, she heard the muffled sounds of airstrikes through the airport’s soundproofed walls.
As the plane took off, the crew and most of the passengers remained calm. One man pointed out the window to show his young son the smoke rising. The plane made it safely to Cyprus.
Daoud said her parents want to return home despite the risks, so she is traveling back with them in a few days. She plans to leave again soon after, but she knows she can “come back at a day’s notice” if her family needs her.
“As long as the airport is open, I know that (MEA) are going to be flying,” she said.


Tens of thousands of Palestinians flee West Bank refugee camps

Tens of thousands of Palestinians flee West Bank refugee camps
Updated 18 February 2025
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Tens of thousands of Palestinians flee West Bank refugee camps

Tens of thousands of Palestinians flee West Bank refugee camps
  • The camps, built for descendants of Palestinian refugees who fled or were driven from their homes in the 1948 war around the creation of the state of Israel, have long been major centers for armed militant groups

JERUSALEM: Tens of thousands of Palestinians living in refugee camps in the occupied West Bank have left their homes as a weeks-long Israeli offensive has demolished houses and torn up vital infrastructure in the heavily built up townships, Palestinian authorities said.
Israeli forces began their operation in the refugee camp in the northern West Bank city of Jenin on Jan. 21, deploying hundreds of troops and bulldozers that demolished houses and dug up roads, driving almost all of the camp’s residents out.
“We don’t know what’s going on in the camp but there is continuous demolition and roads being dug up,” said Mohammed Al-Sabbagh, head of the Jenin camp services committee.

An Israeli army excavator demolishes a residential building in the Tulkarem camp for Palestinian refugees during an ongoing Israeli military operation in the occupied West Bank on February 18, 2025. (AFP)

The operation, which Israel says is aimed at thwarting Iranian-backed militant groups in the West Bank, has since been extended to other camps, notably the Tulkarm refugee camp and the nearby Nur Shams camp, both of which have also been devastated. The camps, built for descendants of Palestinian refugees who fled or were driven from their homes in the 1948 war around the creation of the state of Israel, have long been major centers for armed militant groups. They have been raided repeatedly by the Israeli military but the current operation, which began as a ceasefire was agreed in Gaza, has been on an unusually large scale. According to figures from the Palestinian Authority, around 17,000 people have now left Jenin refugee camp, leaving the site almost completely deserted, while in Nur Shams 6,000 people, or about two thirds of the total, have left, with another 10,000 leaving from Tulkarm camp.
“The ones who are left are trapped,” said Nihad Al-Shawish, head of the Nur Shams camp services committee. “The Civil Defense, the Red Crescent and the Palestinian security forces brought them some food yesterday but the army is still bulldozing and destroying the camp.” The Israeli raids have demolished dozens of houses and torn up large stretches of roadway as well as cutting off water and power, but the military has denied forcing residents to leave their homes.
“People obviously have the possibility to move or go where they want, if they will. But if they don’t, they’re allowed to stay,” Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani told reporters.
The operation began as Israel moved to banish the main UN Palestinian relief organization UNRWA from its headquarters in East Jerusalem and cut it off from any contact with Israeli officials.
The ban, which took effect at the end of January, has hit UNRWA’s work in the West Bank and Gaza, where it provides aid for millions of Palestinians in the refugee camps.
Israel has accused UNRWA of cooperating with Hamas and said some UNRWA workers even took part in the Hamas-led attack on communities in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023 that set off the 15-month war in Gaza.

 


More than one million Syrians return to their homes: UN

People walk past shops in Homs on February 10, 2025. (AFP)
People walk past shops in Homs on February 10, 2025. (AFP)
Updated 19 February 2025
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More than one million Syrians return to their homes: UN

People walk past shops in Homs on February 10, 2025. (AFP)
  • “Since the fall of the regime in Syria we estimate that 280,000 Syrian refugees and more than 800,000 people displaced inside the country have returned to their homes,” Filippo Grandi, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees

GENEVA: More than one million people have returned to their homes in Syria after the overthrow of Bashar Assad, including 280,000 refugees who came back from abroad, the UN said on Tuesday.
Assad was toppled in December in a rebel offensive, putting an end to his family’s decades-long grip on power in the Middle Eastern country and bookmarking a civil war that broke out in 2011, with the brutal repression of anti-government protests.
Syria’s war has killed more than half a million people and displaced millions from their homes.
The Islamist-led rebels whose offensive ousted Assad have sought to assure the international community that they have broken with their past and will respect the rights of minorities.
“Since the fall of the regime in Syria we estimate that 280,000 Syrian refugees and more than 800,000 people displaced inside the country have returned to their homes,” Filippo Grandi, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, wrote on the X social media platform.
“Early recovery efforts must be bolder and faster, though, otherwise people will leave again: this is now urgent!” he said.
At a meeting in Paris in mid-February, some 20 countries, including Arab nations, Turkiye, Britain, France, Germany, Canada and Japan agreed at the close of a conference in Paris to “work together to ensure the success of the transition in a process led by Syria.”
The meeting’s final statement also pledged support for Syria’s new authorities in the fight against “all forms of terrorism and extremism.”
 

 


Israeli military says it struck weapons belonging to former Syrian administration in southern Syria

Israeli military says it struck weapons belonging to former Syrian administration in southern Syria
Updated 19 February 2025
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Israeli military says it struck weapons belonging to former Syrian administration in southern Syria

Israeli military says it struck weapons belonging to former Syrian administration in southern Syria

CAIRO: The Israeli military said on Tuesday that it struck weapons which it said belonged to the former Syrian administration in southern Syria.

 


Algiers slams French minister’s visit to W. Sahara

Algiers slams French minister’s visit to W. Sahara
Updated 18 February 2025
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Algiers slams French minister’s visit to W. Sahara

Algiers slams French minister’s visit to W. Sahara
  • France’s stance on Western Sahara has been ambiguous in recent years, often straining its ties with Morocco

ALGIERS: Algeria on Tuesday denounced a visit by French Culture Minister Rachida Dati to Western Sahara, after Paris recognized Moroccan sovereignty over the disputed territory, as “objectionable on multiple levels.”
The vast desert territory is a former Spanish colony largely controlled by Morocco but claimed for decades by the Algeria-backed Polisario Front.
Dati, who described her visit as “historic,” launched with Moroccan Culture Minister Mohamed Mehdi Bensaid a French cultural mission in the territory’s main city, Laayoune.
An Algerian foreign ministry statement posted on social media Tuesday said the visit “reflects blatant disregard for international legality by a permanent member of the UN Security Council.”
“This visit reinforces Morocco’s fait accompli in Western Sahara, a territory where the decolonization process remains incomplete and the right to self-determination unfulfilled,” it said.
Dati’s trip, a first for a French official, “reflects the detestable image of a former colonial power in solidarity with a new one,” the statement added.
The United Nations considers Western Sahara to be a “non-self-governing territory” and has had a peacekeeping mission there since 1991, whose stated aim is to organize a referendum on the territory’s future.
But Rabat has repeatedly rejected any vote in which independence is an option, instead proposing autonomy under Morocco.
France’s stance on Western Sahara has been ambiguous in recent years, often straining its ties with Morocco.
But in July, French President Emmanuel Macron said Rabat’s autonomy plan was the “only basis” to resolve the Western Sahara dispute.
Algeria has backed the separatist Polisario Front and cut diplomatic relations with Rabat in 2021 — the year after Morocco normalized ties with Israel under a deal that awarded it US recognition of its annexation of the Western Sahara.
In October, the UN Security Council called for parties to “resume negotiations” to reach a “lasting and mutually acceptable solution” to the Western Sahara dispute.
In November 2020, the Polisario Front said it was ending a 29-year ceasefire with Morocco after Moroccan troops were deployed to the far south of the territory to remove independence supporters blocking the only road to Mauritania.
The Polisario Front claims the route is illegal, arguing that it did not exist when the ceasefire was established in 1991.
 

 


Kurdistan region’s pipeline restart ready to go, foreign minister says

Kurdistan region’s pipeline restart ready to go, foreign minister says
Updated 18 February 2025
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Kurdistan region’s pipeline restart ready to go, foreign minister says

Kurdistan region’s pipeline restart ready to go, foreign minister says
  • Baghdad has periodically withheld the Kurdistan region’s share of the federal budget to try to stop it from exporting oil independently

BAGHDAD: A major pipeline connecting Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region to Turkiye is ready to reopen and resume exports, the Kurdish foreign minister said on Tuesday, potentially ending a dispute between Baghdad and Irbil that led to the closure of the pipeline in 2023.
Foreign Minister Safeen Dizayee declined to say when the pipeline would reopen but said it would mark a turning point in relations between Kurdistan and Baghdad.
Iraq’s oil minister said on Monday the Iraq-Turkiye pipeline (ITP) will resume next week.
“All arrangements that were set on the table have been agreed to, with the aim to prepare for re-exports. There shouldn’t be any hiccups. The legal aspects have been met, the technical aspects are in place,” Dizayee told Reuters by phone. “The button just has to be pushed to increase production and then re-export.”
The oil flows were halted by Turkiye in March 2023 after the International Chamber of Commerce ordered Ankara to pay Baghdad damages of $1.5 billion for unauthorized pipeline exports by the Kurdistan Regional Government between 2014 and 2018.
Negotiations to restart the pipeline have been ongoing, with US officials participating in some of the talks.
Resuming oil exports will boost the Kurdistan region’s budget, Dizayee said.
“This means Kurdistan will benefit from the federal budget and hopefully this will end the saga of (civil servants’) salaries coming or not coming, received in dribs and drabs,” Dizayee said.
Baghdad has periodically withheld the Kurdistan region’s share of the federal budget to try to stop it from exporting oil independently.
Oil producers in the Kurdistan region have had to wind down production without an export route. It will likely take some time for them to restart their oil wells and for the pipeline to use its full capacity. Before it was shut down, it transported around 450,000 barrels per day.
“They’ve invested a lot. It was a risk they took and it must pay off. They [the companies] need assurances that their investment will not be down the drain,” Dizayee said. “Compensation is something that needs to be discussed.”
An international consultancy will be brought in to do an assessment of the cost of production, expenses, cost recovery and the production sharing agreements, he said.