SANAA: The UN envoy for Yemen carried a plan to halt fighting around the key aid port of Hodeidah where Houthi militia have been battling a regional coalition as he arrived Saturday in the rebel-held capital Sanaa for emergency talks.
Martin Griffiths was expected to propose to militia leaders that they cede control of the Red Sea port to a UN-supervised committee and halt heavy clashes against advancing government troops backed by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
The envoy did not make any statement on his arrival at Sanaa international airport.
More than 70 percent of Yemeni imports pass through Hodeidah’s docks and the fighting has raised UN fears of humanitarian catastrophe in a country already teetering on the brink of famine.
Yemen’s government and its allies launched their offensive on Wednesday, after at least 139 combatants have been killed, according to medical and military sources.
The Iranian-backed Houthi militia have controlled the Hodeidah region with its population of some 600,000 people since 2014.
The capture of Hodeidah would be the coalition’s biggest victory of the war so far, and militia leader Abdel Malek Al-Houthi on Thursday called on his forces to put up fierce resistance and turn the region into a quagmire for coalition troops.
The Yemeni army on Saturday claimed it had seized control of the militia base at Hodeidah’s disused airport, which has been closed since 2014.
An AFP correspondent on the front line could not confirm the report and a spokesman for the coalition, which has troops taking part in the offensive, did not respond to repeated requests for comment.
But military sources later denied that the army had entered the airport.
They told AFP, however, that sporadic clashes were underway at the airport’s southern gate.
The highway between Hodeidah and the government-held port of Mokha was also the scene of fighting, they said, adding that loyalist forces had suffered “losses.”
The United Nations and relief organizations have warned that any all-out assault on Hodeidah would put hundreds of thousands of people at risk.
The fighting is already nearing densely populated residential areas, the Norwegian Refugee Council warned, and aid distributions have been suspended in the west of the city.
The International Committee of the Red Cross said thousands were likely to flee if the fighting continued.
On Thursday, the UN Security Council demanded that Hodeidah port be kept open to vital food shipments but stopped short of backing a Swedish call for a pause in the offensive to allow for talks on a militia withdrawal.
UN envoy in Yemen for Hodeidah crisis talks
UN envoy in Yemen for Hodeidah crisis talks
- UN envoy for Yemen has a plan to halt fighting around the key aid port of Hodeidah where Houthi militia have been battling a regional coalition
- Martin Griffiths was expected to propose to militia leaders that they cede control of the Red Sea port to a UN-supervised committee
Lebanon hopes for neighborly relations in first message to new Syria government
- Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah played a major part propping up Syria’s ousted President Bashar Assad through years of war
- Syria’s new Islamist de-facto leader Ahmed Al-Sharaa is seeking to establish relations with Arab and Western leaders
DUBAI: Lebanon said on Thursday it was looking forward to having the best neighborly relations with Syria, in its first official message to the new administration in Damascus.
Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib passed the message to his Syrian counterpart, Asaad Hassan Al-Shibani, in a phone call, the Lebanese Foreign Ministry said on X.
Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah played a major part propping up Syria’s ousted President Bashar Assad through years of war, before bringing its fighters back to Lebanon over the last year to fight in a bruising war with Israel – a redeployment which weakened Syrian government lines.
Under Assad, Hezbollah used Syria to bring in weapons and other military equipment from Iran, through Iraq and Syria and into Lebanon. But on Dec. 6, anti-Assad fighters seized the border with Iraq and cut off that route, and two days later, Islamist militants captured the capital Damascus.
Syria’s new Islamist de-facto leader Ahmed Al-Sharaa is seeking to establish relations with Arab and Western leaders after toppling Assad.
Iraqi intelligence chief discusses border security with new Syrian administration
BAGHDAD: An Iraqi delegation met with Syria’s new rulers in Damascus on Thursday, an Iraqi government spokesman said, the latest diplomatic outreach more than two weeks after the fall of Bashar Assad’s rule.
The delegation, led by Iraqi intelligence chief Hamid Al-Shatri, “met with the new Syrian administration,” government spokesman Bassem Al-Awadi told state media, adding that the parties discussed “the developments in the Syrian arena, and security and stability needs on the two countries’ shared border.”
Israeli minister’s Al-Aqsa mosque visit sparks condemnation
- Ben Gvir has repeatedly defied the Israeli government’s longstanding ban on Jewish prayer at the site in Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem
JERUSALEM: Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir visited Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa mosque compound on Thursday, triggering angry reactions from the Palestinian Authority and Jordan accusing the far-right politician of a deliberate provocation.
Ben Gvir has repeatedly defied the Israeli government’s longstanding ban on Jewish prayer at the site in Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem, which is revered by both Muslims and Jews and has been a focal point of tensions in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
“I went up to the site of our temple this morning to pray for the peace of our soldiers, the swift return of all hostages and a total victory, God willing,” Ben Gvir said in a message on social media platform X, referring to the Gaza war and the dozens of Israeli captives held in the Palestinian territory.
He also posted a photo of himself on the holy site, with members of the Israeli security forces and the famed golden Dome of the Rock in the background.
The Al-Aqsa compound in Jerusalem’s Old City is Islam’s third-holiest site and a symbol of Palestinian national identity.
Known to Jews as the Temple Mount, it is also Judaism’s holiest place, revered as the site of the second temple destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD.
Under the status quo maintained by Israel, which has occupied east Jerusalem and its Old City since 1967, Jews and other non-Muslims are allowed to visit the compound during specified hours, but they are not permitted to pray there or display religious symbols.
Palestinians claim east Jerusalem as their future capital, while Israeli leaders have insisted that the entire city is their “undivided” capital.
The Palestinian Authority’s foreign ministry said in a statement that it “condemns” Ben Gvir’s latest visit, calling his prayer at the site a “provocation to millions of Palestinians and Muslims.”
Jordan, which administers the mosque compound, similarly condemned what its foreign ministry called Ben Gvir’s “provocative and unacceptable” actions.
The ministry’s statement decried a “violation of the historical and legal status quo.”
The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a brief statement that “the status quo on the Temple Mount has not changed.”
UN force sounds alarm over Israeli ‘destruction’ in south Lebanon
- Under the ceasefire agreement, UNIFIL peacekeepers and the Lebanese army were to redeploy in south Lebanon, near the Israeli border, as Israeli forces withdrew over 60 days
BEIRUT: The United Nations’ peacekeeping force in Lebanon expressed concern on Thursday at the “continuing” damage done by Israeli forces in the country’s south despite a ceasefire in the war with Hezbollah.
The truce went into effect on November 27, about two months after Israel stepped up its bombing campaign and later sent troops into Lebanon following nearly a year of exchanges of cross-border fire initiated by Hezbollah over the war in Gaza.
The warring sides have since traded accusations of violating the truce.
Under the ceasefire agreement, UNIFIL peacekeepers and the Lebanese army were to redeploy in south Lebanon, near the Israeli border, as Israeli forces withdrew over 60 days.
UNIFIL said in a statement on Thursday that “there is concern at continuing destruction by the IDF (army) in residential areas, agricultural land and road networks in south Lebanon.”
The statement added that “this is in violation of Resolution 1701,” which was adopted by the UN Security Council and ended the last Israel-Hezbollah war of 2006.
The UN force also reiterated its call for “the timely withdrawal” of Israeli troops from Lebanon, and “the full implementation of Resolution 1701.”
The resolution states that Lebanese troops and UN peacekeepers should be the only forces in south Lebanon, where Hezbollah exerts control, and also calls for Israeli troops to withdraw from Lebanese territory.
“Any actions that risk the fragile cessation of hostilities must cease,” UNIFIL said.
On Monday the force had urged “accelerated progress” in the Israeli military’s withdrawal.
Lebanon’s official National News Agency (NNA) reported on Thursday “extensive” operations by Israeli forces in the south.
It said residents of Qantara fled to a nearby village “following an incursion by Israeli enemy forces into their town.”
On Wednesday the NNA said Israeli aircraft struck the eastern Baalbek region, far from the border.
Syria forces carry out operation against pro-Assad ‘militias’: state media
- Operation had already succeeded in ‘neutralizing a certain number’ of armed men loyal to Assad
DUBAI: The new Syrian military administration announced on Thursday that it was launching a security operation in Tartous province, according to the Syrian state news agency.
The operation aims to maintain security in the region and target remnants of the Assad regime still operating in the area.
The announcement marks a significant move by the new administration as it consolidates its authority in the coastal province.
The operation had already succeeded in “neutralizing a certain number” of armed men loyal to toppled president Bashar Assad, state news agency SANA reported said.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor has reported several arrests in connection with Wednesday’s clashes.
Further details about the scope or duration of the operation have not yet been disclosed.
