ANKARA: Turkey’s top security body, the National Security Council (MGK), on Tuesday recommended that the government deploy forces around Syria’s Kurdish-held Afrin canton and in western Aleppo.
The MGK emphasized Turkey’s determination to secure its borders against terrorist groups. Afrin is controlled by the US-backed Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), which Ankara views as the Syrian affiliate of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
On Monday, Turkish Defense Minister Nurettin Canikli hinted at a possible operation in Afrin, saying such an operation “may be tomorrow or... sooner than tomorrow.”
Last week, he said the PKK/YPG presence in Afrin poses a “serious danger and threat that should be removed in line with Turkey’s rights arising from international law.”
The Turkish military recently completed the formation of its third observation post in Syria’s northwest Idlib province, as part of a cease-fire co-guaranteed with Russia and Iran.
Earlier this month, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said his country needed to clear Afrin of the YPG after accomplishing its military operation in Idlib.
But Serhat Erkmen, a Middle East expert at the Ankara-based 21st Century Turkey Institute, told Arab News: “Following the agreement reached in Sochi last week between Moscow, Tehran and Ankara, a comprehensive military operation that would escalate regional tension is unlikely.”
He added: “Even if it took place, it wouldn’t be a military operation that changes the balance power fundamentally, at a time when the Syrian conflict is evolving toward a political settlement.”
Turkey’s Operation Euphrates Shield in northern Syria last year was conducted after getting the green light from Moscow.
Any move on Afrin, where Russian military observers were deployed this summer, would also need its approval.
“Ankara should reach an agreement with Moscow over who will control Afrin if the PKK/YPG are removed from the region: The Syrian regime or the Free Syrian Army (FSA), which is backed by Turkey? It’s the key question,” Erkmen said. “Turkey won’t feel secure so long as the PKK is in Afrin.”
But the risks of such an operation may be prohibitively high, he added. “First of all, there’s a military risk. The PKK has been preparing for a possible Turkish operation for a while.”
Erkmen said: “One shouldn’t forget the political risks as well. We don’t know how the Syrian government will react.”
He added: “If the perceived security threat is bigger than the current risk, decision-makers will take into consideration the dynamics not only of Syria but the whole region.”
Bora Bayraktar, a Middle East expert from Istanbul Kultur University, told Arab News: “The operation will be mostly a continuation of Turkey’s military engagement in the Idlib de-escalation zone.”
“The region will be contained by moving as close as possible to Aleppo and the town of Tal Rifat,” he said.
“Fifty-five percent of Afrin’s population are Arabs, Kurds make up 30-35 percent, and the rest are Turkmen. With the stability that would be brought by a possible Turkish operation, the return of displaced populations may restore the original demography and neutralize the PKK/YPG presence.”
If Syrian-Kurdish forces resist the Turkish operation, Ankara may use aerial attacks and shelling without launching a ground operation with its troops, Bayraktar said.
Turkey hints at imminent Afrin operation
Turkey hints at imminent Afrin operation
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Israel hospital says woman killed in stabbing attack in coastal city
- Israel’s police said the suspected attacker had been arrested
“She was brought to the hospital with multiple stab wounds while undergoing resuscitation efforts, but the hospital staff was forced to pronounce her death upon arrival,” Tel Aviv Ichilov hospital said in a statement. Israel’s police said the suspected attacker had been arrested.
Yemen Houthis claim missile attack on Tel Aviv airport: statement
- Houthis also launched drones at Tel Aviv and a ship in the Arabian Sea
SANAA: Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthis on Friday claimed a strike against the airport in Israel’s commercial hub of Tel Aviv on Friday, after Israeli air strikes hit rebel-held Sanaa’s international airport and other targets in Yemen.
The Israeli strikes on Thursday landed as the head of the UN’s World Health Organization said he and his team were preparing to fly out from Yemen’s Houthi rebel-held capital.
Hours later on Friday, the Houthis said they fired a missile at Ben Gurion airport and launched drones at Tel Aviv as well as a ship in the Arabian Sea.
No other details were immediately available.
Yemen’s civil aviation authority said the airport planned to reopen on Friday after the strikes that it said occurred while the UN aircraft “was getting ready for its scheduled flight.”
The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment on whether they knew at the time that WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus was there. Israel’s attack came a day after the Iran-backed Houthi rebels claimed the firing of a missile and two drones at Israel.
Yemen’s Houthis have stepped up their attacks against Israel since late November when a ceasefire took effect between Israel and another Iran-backed group, Lebanon’s Hezbollah.
The Houthis Al-Masirah TV said the Israeli strikes killed six people, after earlier Houthi statements said two people died at the rebel-held capital’s airport, and another at Ras Issa port.
The strikes targeting the airport, military facilities and power stations in rebel areas marked the second time since December 19 that Israel has hit targets in Yemen after rebel missile fire toward Israel.
In his latest warning to the rebels, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel would “continue until the job is done.”
“We are determined to cut this branch of terrorism from the Iranian axis of evil,” he said in a video statement.
UN chief condemns ‘escalation’ between Yemen’s Houthis and Israel
- UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres calls Israeli strikes on Sanaa airport ‘especially alarming’
NEW YORK: The UN chief on Thursday denounced the “escalation” in hostilities between Yemen’s Houthi militias and Israel, terming strikes on the Sanaa airport “especially alarming.”
“The Secretary-General condemns the escalation between Yemen and Israel. Israeli airstrikes today on Sana’a International Airport, the Red Sea ports and power stations in Yemen are especially alarming,” said a spokesperson for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres in a statement.
Israeli air strikes pummeled Sanaa’s international airport and other targets in Yemen on Thursday, with Houthi militia media reporting six deaths.
The attack came a day after the Houthis fired a missile and two drones at Israel.
World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on social media he was at the airport during the strike, with the UN saying that a member of its air crew was injured.
The United Nations put the death toll from the airport strikes at three, with “dozens more injured.”
UN chief Guterres expressed particular alarm at the threat that bombing transportation infrastructure posed to humanitarian aid operations in Yemen, where 80 percent of the population is dependent on aid.
“The Secretary-General remains deeply concerned about the risk of further escalation in the region and reiterates his call for all parties concerned to cease all military actions and exercise utmost restraint,” he said.
“He also warns that airstrikes on Red Sea ports and Sana’a airport pose grave risks to humanitarian operations at a time when millions of people are in need of life-saving assistance.”
The UN chief condemned the Houthi militias for “a year of escalatory actions... in the Red Sea and the region that threaten civilians, regional stability and freedom of maritime navigation.”
The Houthis are part of Iran’s “axis of resistance” alliance against Israel.
Bodies of about 100 Kurdish women, children found in Iraq mass grave
TAL AL-SHAIKHIA, Iraq: Iraqi authorities are working to exhume the remains of around 100 Kurdish women and children thought to have been killed in the 1980s under former Iraqi ruler Saddam Hussein, three officials said.
The grave was discovered in Tal Al-Shaikhia in the Muthanna province in southern Iraq, about 15-20 kilometers (10-12 miles) from the main road there, an AFP journalist said.
Specialized teams began exhuming the grave earlier this month after it was initially discovered in 2019, said Diaa Karim, the head of the Iraqi authority for mass graves, adding that it is the second such grave to be uncovered at the site.
“After removing the first layer of soil and the remains appearing clearly, it was discovered that they all belonged to women and children dressed in Kurdish springtime clothes,” Karim told AFP on Wednesday.
He added that they likely came from Kalar in the northern Sulaimaniyah province, part of what is now Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region, estimating that there were “no less than 100” people buried in the grave.
Efforts to exhume all the bodies are ongoing, he said, adding that the numbers could change.
Following Iraq’s deadly war with Iran in the 1980s, Saddam’s government carried out the ruthless “Anfal Operation” between 1987 and 1988 in which it is thought to have killed around 180,000 Kurds.
Saddam was toppled in 2003 following a US-led invasion of Iraq and was hanged three years later, putting an end to Iraqi proceedings against him on charges of genocide over the Anfal campaign.
Karim said a large number of the victims found in the grave “were executed here with live shots to the head fired at short range.”
He suggested some of them may have been “buried alive” as there was no evidence of bullets in their remains.
Ahmed Qusai, the head of the excavation team for mass graves in Iraq, meanwhile pointed to “difficulties we are facing at this grave because the remains have become entangled as some of the mothers were holding their infants” when they were killed.
Durgham Kamel, part of the authority for exhuming mass graves, said another mass grave was found at the same time that they began exhuming the one at Tal Al-Shaikhia.
He said the burial site was located near the notorious Nugrat Al-Salman prison where Saddam’s authorities held dissidents.
The Iraqi government estimates that about 1.3 million people disappeared between 1980 and 1990 as a result of atrocities and other rights violations committed under Saddam.
Brother of suspected ‘terrorist’ stabs Tunisia National Guard officer
TUNIS: The brother of a suspected “terrorist” on Thursday stabbed a Tunisian National Guard officer in the eastern Monastir governorate, a judicial source told AFP.
Earlier in the day, a National Guard unit attempted to arrest the suspect — accused by authorities of being a member of a “terrorist group” — at his home, said the source, speaking on condition of anonymity.
During the arrest operation, his brother attacked the officer, the source added.
The source said the officer was hospitalized following the stabbing in his abdomen and was recovering after undergoing surgery.
An investigation was opened by the judicial division combatting terrorism, the source added.
Neither of the brothers, both of whom were taken into police custody, have been named, and the Tunisian interior ministry did not respond to AFP’s request for comment.
Tunisia saw a surge in jihadist groups after the 2011 revolution that overthrew the dictatorship of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.
Attacks claimed by jihadists in recent years have killed dozens of soldiers and police officers, as well as some civilians and foreign tourists.
Jihadist attacks in Sousse and the capital Tunis in 2015 killed dozens of tourists and police, but authorities say they have since made significant progress against extremism.
