Lebanon reels from double blow of virus pandemic and currency crash

1 / 2
Lebanese security forces inspect the area near the Fransabank branch in Sidon after assailants targeted the bank’s entrance with an explosive device. (AFP)
2 / 2
Anti-government protesters, some wearing masks to help curb the spread of the coronavirus, shout slogans as they march during a protest against the Lebanese central bank's governor Riad Salameh and against the deepening financial crisis, at Hamra trade street, in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, April 23, 2020. (AP)
Short Url
Updated 27 April 2020
Follow

Lebanon reels from double blow of virus pandemic and currency crash

  • Beirut allows vocations, restaurants, goldsmiths, toy and flower shops to resume work
  • Maronite Patriarch: Criticism of Banque du Liban governor unacceptable

BEIRUT:  Lebanon was reeling on Sunday under the twin blows of the coronavirus pandemic and a financial crisis that threatened to make the national currency virtually worthless.
Authorities recorded three new virus cases, raising the total to 707, and the death toll remained unchanged at 24.

Lockdown restrictions will be eased on Monday. Face masks are compulsory, but shops, factories and restaurants may open for longer, and people in vocational trades such as plumbers and carpenters will be allowed to work.

However, the pandemic is being overshadowed by the plunging value of the Lebanese pound and a political row over the culpability of central bank governor Riad Salameh.

The currency has lost more than half its value since October and slid to record lows on the black market last week, reaching 4,200 to the dollar before currency dealers went on strike.

Prime Minister Hassan Diab blamed Salameh for the currency crisis, and the governor was also attacked by Free Patriotic Movement leader Gebran Bassil. 

“Thieving, corrupt, and greedy beneficiaries as well as bank owners, shareholders, and the central bank” were responsible for the state’s financial losses, Bassil said.

However, the governor was defended by parliamentary speaker Nabih Berri and Maronite Christian Patriarch Bechara Boutros Al-Rai.

Berri said Lebanon could not afford to remove Salameh just as it was entering negotiations with foreign bondholders after defaulting on debt obligations. 

“Lebanese will wake up to the price of the dollar at 15,000 pounds,” he said. 

“If the central bank of Lebanon does not remain, then everyone knows depositors’ funds are gone for ever.”

Al-Rai said criticism of Salameh would only hurt Lebanon. “We ask, who benefits from the destabilization of the central bank governorship? We know the dire outcome, which is eliminating the confidence of the Lebanese people and other countries in the constitutional foundations of the state.”

Amid growing public unrest, a bomb was detonated on Saturday night outside a bank in Sidon, the phrase “You are in danger” was sprayed outside several other banks in the city, and a bank in Tyre was attacked with petrol bombs early on Sunday. 

Licensed moneychangers will resume work on Monday, having not done so since Thursday in protest of the “unjustified deterioration of the exchange rate.” 

This return coincides with the growing political tension toward the monetary policy of the governor of the Banque du Liban. The head of the Syndicate of Money Changers, Mahmoud Murad, told Arab News: “We are literally holding our breath on Monday because things are rapidly developing and heading in a very dangerous direction.”

He added: “Things have got out of control. What is happening is not convincing at all. Some people are messing with the exchange market, and we know nothing about them except that they are controlling the exchange rate even from their houses.”

“We are waiting for the platform that the Banque du Liban promised us to know how to price the dollar, but we have not been informed of anything until now. There is an app on social media known as Lebanese Lira. We do not know its source, but it has been controlling the market for more than 3 months. This app has been shared by people since the dollar’s exchange rate was 1,600 liras. People have only been selling their dollars according to this app’s price. Someone is buying all the dollars on the market in an abnormal way.”

Murad pointed out that he “filed a complaint in the court against this app, but no one has acted yet.” He explained that there were people working from their houses and delivering exchanged money after buying dollars. “This practice dissolves the capital of legitimate money changers,” he said.

He added that dismissing the governor of the Banque du Liban, Riad Salamé, in light of the current political crisis was not the cure. He said the central bank must intervene strongly in the market by injecting $50 million to $100 million for the market price to stabilize. He said: “It is not enough to intervene using $5-$7 million a day, which happened last week for one day.”


Israel’s attorney general tells Netanyahu to reexamine extremist security minister’s role

Updated 15 November 2024
Follow

Israel’s attorney general tells Netanyahu to reexamine extremist security minister’s role

  • National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir criticized for interfering in police matters

JERUSALEM, Nov 14 : Israel’s Attorney General told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to reevaluate the tenure of his far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, citing his apparent interference in police matters, Israel’s Channel 12 reported on Thursday.
The news channel published a copy of a letter written by Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara in which she described instances of “illegitimate interventions” in which Ben-Gvir, who is tasked with setting general policy, gave operational instructions that threaten the police’s apolitical status.
“The concern is that the government’s silence will be interpreted as support for the minister’s behavior,” the letter said.
Officials at the Justice Ministry could not be reached for comment and there was no immediate comment from Netanyahu’s office.
Ben-Gvir, who heads a small ultra-nationalist party in Netanyahu’s coalition, wrote on social media after the letter was published: “The attempted coup by (the Attorney General) has begun. The only dismissal that needs to happen is that of the Attorney General.”


Israeli forces demolish Palestinian Al-Bustan community center in Jerusalem

Updated 15 November 2024
Follow

Israeli forces demolish Palestinian Al-Bustan community center in Jerusalem

  • Al-Bustan Association functioned as a primary community center in which Silwan’s youth and families ran cultural and social activities

LONDON: Israeli forces demolished the office of the Palestinian Al-Bustan Association in occupied East Jerusalem’s neighborhood of Silwan, whose residents are under threat of Israeli eviction orders. 

The Palestinian Authority’s Ministry of Culture condemned on Thursday the demolition of Al-Bustan by Israeli bulldozers and a military police force. 

The ministry said that “(Israeli) occupation’s arrogant practices against cultural and community institutions in Palestine, and specifically in Jerusalem, are targeting the Palestinian identity, in an attempt to obliterate it.” 

Founded in 2004, the Al-Bustan Association functioned as a primary community center in which Silwan’s youth and families ran cultural and social activities alongside hosting meetings for diplomatic delegations and Western journalists who came to learn about controversial Israeli policies in the area. 

Al-Bustan said in a statement that it served 1,500 people in Silwan, most of them children, who enrolled in educational, cultural and artistic workshops. In addition to the Al-Bustan office, Israeli forces also demolished a home in the neighborhood belonging to the Al-Qadi family. 

Located less than a mile from Al-Aqsa Mosque and Jerusalem’s southern ancient wall, Silwan has a population of 65,000 Palestinians, some of them under threat of Israeli eviction orders.  

In past years, Israeli authorities have been carrying out archaeological digging under Palestinian homes in Silwan, resulting in damage to these buildings, in search of the three-millennial “City of David.” 


Israeli strike kills 12 after hitting civil defense center in Lebanon’s Baalbek, governor tells Reuters

Updated 14 November 2024
Follow

Israeli strike kills 12 after hitting civil defense center in Lebanon’s Baalbek, governor tells Reuters

  • Eight others, including five women, were also killed and 27 wounded in another Israeli attack

CAIRO: An Israeli strike killed 12 people after it hit a civil defense center in Lebanon’s city of Baalbek on Thursday, the regional governor told Reuters adding that rescue operations were ongoing.
Eight others, including five women, were also killed and 27 wounded in another Israeli attack on the Lebanese city, health ministry reported on Thursday.
Meanwhile, Lebanese civil defense official Samir Chakia said: “The Civil Defense Center in Baalbek has been targeted, five Civil Defense rescuers were killed.”
Bachir Khodr the regional governor said more than 20 rescuers had been at the facility at the time of the strike.


‘A symbol of resilience’ — workers in Iraq complete reconstruction of famous Mosul minaret

Updated 14 November 2024
Follow

‘A symbol of resilience’ — workers in Iraq complete reconstruction of famous Mosul minaret

  • Workers complete reconstruction of 12th-century minaret of Al-Nuri Mosque
  • Tower and mosque were blown by Daesh extremists in 2017

High above the narrow streets and low-rise buildings of Mosul’s old city, beaming workers hoist an Iraqi flag into the sky atop one of the nation’s most famous symbols of resilience.

Perched precariously on scaffolding in high-vis jackets and hard hats, the workers celebrate a milestone in Iraq’s recovery from the traumatic destruction and bloodshed that once engulfed the city.

On Wednesday, the workers placed the last brick that marked the completed reconstruction of the 12th-century minaret of Al-Nuri Mosque. The landmark was destroyed by Daesh in June 2017 shortly before Iraqi forces drove the extremist group from the city.

Known as Al-Hadba, or “the hunchback,” the 45-meter-tall minaret, which famously leant to one side, dominated the Mosul skyline for centuries. The tower has been painstakingly rebuilt as part of a UNESCO project, matching the traditional stone and brick masonry and incorporating the famous lean.

“Today UNESCO celebrates a landmark achievement,” the UN cultural agency’s Iraq office said. “The completion of the shaft of the Al-Hadba Minaret marks a new milestone in the revival of the city, with and for the people of Mosul. 

“UNESCO is grateful for the incredible teamwork that made this vision a reality. Together, we’ve created a powerful symbol of resilience, a true testament to international cooperation. Thank you to everyone involved in this journey.”

The restoration of the mosque is part of UNESCO’s Revive the Spirit of Mosul project, which includes the rebuilding of two churches and other historic sites. The UAE donated $50 million to the project and UNESCO said that the overall Al-Nuri Mosque complex restoration will be finished by the end of the year.

UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay celebrated the completion of the minaret by posting “We did it!” on social media site X.

She thanked donors, national and local authorities in Iraq and the experts and professionals, “many of whom are Moslawis,” who worked to rebuild the minaret.

“Can’t wait to return to Mosul to celebrate the full completion of our work,” she said.

The Al-Nuri mosque was built in the second half of the 12th century by the Seljuk ruler Nur Al-Din. 

After Daesh seized control of large parts of Iraq in 2014, the group’s leader, Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, declared the establishment of its so-called caliphate from inside the mosque.

Three years later, the extremists detonated explosives to destroy the mosque and minaret as Iraqi forces battled to expel them from the city. Thousands of civilians were killed in the fighting and much of Mosul was left in ruins.


US hands Lebanon draft truce proposal -two political sources

Updated 14 November 2024
Follow

US hands Lebanon draft truce proposal -two political sources

  • The US has sought to broker a ceasefire that would end hostilities between its ally Israel and Hezbollah

BEIRUT: The US ambassador to Lebanon submitted a draft truce proposal to Lebanon’s speaker of parliament Nabih Berri on Thursday to halt fighting between armed group Hezbollah and Israel, two political sources told Reuters, without revealing details.
The US has sought to broker a ceasefire that would end hostilities between its ally Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah, but efforts have yet to yield a result. Israel launched a stepped-up air and ground campaign in late September after cross-border clashes in parallel with the Gaza war.