New evidence of Qatar’s $1 billion ransom that funds terror

In this April 21, 2017 file photo, the Emir of Qatar Sheikh Tamim Al-Thani, second left in front row, welcomes released kidnapped members of Qatar’s ruling family at the Doha airport, Qatar. (AP)
Updated 18 July 2018
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New evidence of Qatar’s $1 billion ransom that funds terror

  • 28 Qataris were taken hostage on Dec 16, 2015, while hunting with falcons in southern Iraq, having ignored all warnings about not traveling to the area
  • Qatar paid the biggest ransom in history: $1 billion plus $125 million in “side payments” to terrorist groups such as the Al-Nusra and Kataib Hezbollah

LONDON: Damning new evidence has emerged to suggest that a $1 billion ransom paid by Qatar for the release of 28 Qataris kidnapped in Iraq has been used to fund terror. 

Text messages and voicemails obtained by the BBC reveal communications between Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani, Qatar’s newly appointed foreign minister, and Zayed Al-Khayareen, its ambassador to Iraq, as talks to release the hostages dragged on for 16 months. 

In the end Qatar paid the biggest ransom in history: $1 billion plus $125 million in “side payments,” all paid to groups such as Al Nusra Front, the Al-Qaeda affiliate now known as Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham, and the Iran-backed Iraqi Shiite paramilitary group Kataib Hezbollah. 

The ransom payment was a key factor in driving the Anti-Terror Quartet — Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt — to close borders and sever diplomatic ties with Qatar.

The 28 Qataris were taken hostage on Dec 16, 2015, while hunting with falcons in southern Iraq, having ignored all warnings about not traveling to the area. The party included members of the ruling family.

The kidnappers were identified as members of Kataib Hezbollah but nothing was heard from them until three months later, when they offered to release three hostages in return for “a gesture of goodwill”  — money. 

Ambassador Al-Khayareen wrote in a text to the foreign minister: “This is a good sign for us, which indicates that they are in a hurry and want to end everything soon.”

As the months passed, however, the kidnappers kept upping their demands. As well as money they wanted Qatar to leave the Saudi-led coalition fighting the Houthis in Yemen, and demanded the release of Iranian soldiers held in Syria.

One Kataib Hezbollah negotiator, Abu Mohammed, wanted $10 million for himself. “All of them are thieves,” the ambassador wrote to the minister.

Two Iraqi mediators recruited by the ambassador asked in advance for $150,000 in cash and five Rolex watches when they visited Sheikh Mohammed. Who the “gifts” were for was not clear. Qatari officials admit the texts and voicemails are genuine but say they have been edited in a misleading fashion.


UN says over 200 children killed in Lebanon in under two months

Updated 3 sec ago
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UN says over 200 children killed in Lebanon in under two months

Geneva: The UN said Tuesday that over 200 children have been killed in Lebanon in the less than two months since Israel escalated its attacks targeting Hezbollah.
“Despite more than 200 children killed in Lebanon in less than two months, a disconcerting pattern has emerged: their deaths are met with inertia from those able to stop this violence,” James Elder, spokesman for the UN children’s agency UNICEF, told reporters in Geneva.
“Over the last two months in Lebanon, an average of three children have been killed every single day,” he said.

Israeli army says 40 projectiles fired from Lebanon into central, northern Israel

Updated 29 min 59 sec ago
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Israeli army says 40 projectiles fired from Lebanon into central, northern Israel

  • On Monday, one person was killed and several people injured in two separate incidents

Jerusalem: The Israeli military said on Tuesday that some 40 projectiles were fired from Lebanon into central and northern Israel, with first responders reporting that four people were lightly injured by shrapnel.
“Following sirens that sounded between 09:50 and 09:51 in the Upper Galilee, Western Galilee, and Central Galilee areas, approximately 25 projectiles were identified crossing from Lebanon into Israel. Some of the projectiles were intercepted and fallen projectiles were identified in the area,” the military said in a statement.
That announcement followed earlier reports that some 15 projectiles fired that set of air raid sirens.
A spokesperson for Israeli first responders said that in central Israel it found “four individuals with light injuries from glass shards.... They were injured while in a concrete building where the windows shattered.”
The Israeli police said they were searching the impact sites from projectiles intercepted by Israel’s air defense systems but did not report any serious damage.
On Monday, one person was killed and several people were injured in two separate incidents, one in the northern Israeli town of Shfaram and the other in the suburbs of Israel’s commercial hub of Tel Aviv.
The military said Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement, which is backed by Iran, fired around 100 projectiles from Lebanon toward Israel on Monday, while Israel’s air force carried out strikes on Beirut.
Hezbollah began firing rockets into Israel in October last year in support of the Palestinian militant group Hamas in Gaza. Since September, Israel has conducted extensive bombing campaigns in Lebanon primarily targeting Hezbollah strongholds, though some strikes have hit areas outside the Iran-backed group’s control.


US envoy Amos Hochstein arrives in Lebanon: state media

Updated 19 November 2024
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US envoy Amos Hochstein arrives in Lebanon: state media

  • US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told reporters that Washington had been sharing proposals with the Lebanese and Israeli governments
  • Another Lebanese official said earlier that US Ambassador Lisa Johnson discussed the plan on Thursday with Prime Minister Najib Mikati

Beirut: US special envoy Amos Hochstein arrived in Lebanon for truce talks with officials on Tuesday, state media reported.
The United States and France have spearheaded efforts for a ceasefire in the Israel-Hezbollah war.
On September 23, Israel began an intensified air campaign in Lebanon before sending in ground troops, nearly a year into exchanges of fire initiated by Hezbollah in support of Palestinian ally Hamas after its October 7, 2023 attack sparked the war in Gaza.
A Lebanese official told AFP on Monday that the government had a positive view of a US truce proposal, while a second official said Lebanon was waiting for Hochstein’s arrival to “review certain outstanding points with him.”
On Monday, US State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told reporters that Washington had been sharing proposals with the Lebanese and Israeli governments.
“Both sides have reacted to the proposals that we have put forward,” he said.
Miller said the United States was pushing for “full implementation” of UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended the last Israel-Hezbollah war in 2006 and requires all armed forces except the Lebanese army and UN peacekeepers to withdraw from the Lebanese side of the border with Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday said that even with a deal Israel would “carry out operations against Hezbollah” to keep the group from rebuilding.
Another Lebanese official said earlier that US Ambassador Lisa Johnson discussed the plan on Thursday with Prime Minister Najib Mikati and Hezbollah-allied parliamentary speaker Nabih Berri, who has led mediation efforts on behalf of the group.
If an agreement is reached, the United States and France would issue a joint statement, he said, followed by a 60-day truce during which Lebanon will redeploy troops in the southern border area, near Israel.
Lebanese authorities say more than 3,510 people have been killed since clashes began in October last year, with most fatalities recorded since late September.


Food shortages bring hunger pains to displaced families in central Gaza

Updated 19 November 2024
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Food shortages bring hunger pains to displaced families in central Gaza

  • Almost all of Gaza’s roughly 2.3 million people now rely on international aid for survival, and doctors and aid groups say malnutrition is rampant

DEIR AL-BALAH: A shortage in flour and the closure of a main bakery in central Gaza have exacerbated an already dire humanitarian situation, as Palestinian families struggle to obtain enough food.
A crowd of people waited dejectedly in the cold outside the shuttered Zadna Bakery in Deir Al-Balah on Monday.
Among them was Umm Shadi, a displaced woman from Gaza City, who told The Associated Press that there was no bread left due to the lack of flour — a bag of which costs as much as 400 shekels ($107) in the market, she said, if any can be found.
“Who can buy a bag of flour for 400 shekels?” she asked.
Nora Muhanna, another woman displaced from Gaza City, said she was leaving empty-handed after waiting five or six hours for a bag of bread for her kids.
“From the beginning, there are no goods, and even if they are available, there is no money,” she said.
Almost all of Gaza’s roughly 2.3 million people now rely on international aid for survival, and doctors and aid groups say malnutrition is rampant. Food security experts say famine may already be underway in hard-hit north Gaza. Aid groups accuse the Israeli military of hindering and even blocking shipments in Gaza.
Meanwhile, dozens lined up in Deir Al-Balah to get their share of lentil soup and some bread at a makeshift charity kitchen.
Refat Abed, a displaced man from Gaza City, no longer knows how he can afford food.
“Where can I get money?” he asked. “Do I beg? If it were not for God and charity, my children and I would go hungry,”


Even with Lebanon truce deal, Israel will operate against Hezbollah — Netanyahu

Updated 19 November 2024
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Even with Lebanon truce deal, Israel will operate against Hezbollah — Netanyahu

  • Lebanon’s government has largely endorsed US truce proposal to end Israel-Hezbollah war
  • Israel insists any truce deal must guarantee no further Hezbollah presence in area bordering Israel

JERUSALEM: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that Israel will continue to operate militarily against the Iran-backed Lebanese armed movement Hezbollah even if a ceasefire deal is reached in Lebanon.
“The most important thing is not (the deal that) will be laid on paper,” Netanyahu told the Israeli parliament.
“We will be forced to ensure our security in the north (of Israel) and to systematically carry out operations against Hezbollah’s attacks... even after a ceasefire,” to keep the group from rebuilding, he said.
Netanyahu also said there was no evidence that Hezbollah would respect any ceasefire reached.
“We will not allow Hezbollah to return to the state it was in on October 6” 2023, the eve of the strike by its Palestinian ally Hamas into southern Israel, he said.
Hezbollah then began firing into northern Israel in support of Hamas, triggering exchanges with Israel that escalated into full-on war in late September this year.
Lebanon’s government has largely endorsed a US truce proposal to end the Israel-Hezbollah war and was preparing final comments before responding to Washington, a Lebanese official told AFP on Monday.
Israel insists that any truce deal must guarantee no further Hezbollah presence in the area bordering Israel.