UAE’s Amal spacecraft rockets toward Mars in Arab world first

A representation of Mars and the Hope Probe is seen at the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre ahead of its launch from Tanegashima Island in Japan. (Reuters)
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Updated 20 July 2020
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UAE’s Amal spacecraft rockets toward Mars in Arab world first

  • Liftoff in Japan marked start of a rush that includes attempts by China and the US
  • A newcomer in space development, the UAE has so far successfully launched three observation satellites

TOKYO: A United Arab Emirates spacecraft rocketed away Monday on a seven-month journey to Mars, kicking off the Arab world’s first interplanetary mission.
The liftoff of the Mars orbiter named Amal, or Hope, from Japan marked the start of a rush to fly to Earth’s neighbor that includes attempts by China and the United States.
The UAE said its Amal was functioning after launch as it heads toward Mars.
Omran Sharaf, the project director of Emirates Mars Mission, told journalists in Dubai about an hour and a half after the liftoff that the probe was sending signals. Sharaf said his team now would examine the data, but everything appeared good for now.
People cheered and clapped, with one woman offering a celebratory cry common for weddings.
 

Hope is set to reach Mars in February 2021, the year the UAE celebrates 50 years since the country’s formation.
It blasted off from the Tanegashima Space Center on a small southern Japanese island aboard a Mitsubishi Heavy Industries’ H-IIA rocket, on time at 6:58 a.m. (2158 GMT Sunday) into the blue sky. Mitsubishi said the probe has been successfully separated from the rocket and is now on its solo journey. The launch had been delayed for five days because of stormy weather.
At Mohammed bin Rashid Space Center in Dubai, Emirati men in their traditional white kandora robes and women in their black abayas watched transfixed as the rocket lifted off. As its stages separated, a cheer went out from a group of Emirati men seated on the floor. They began clapping, one using his face mask due to the coronavirus pandemic to wipe away a tear.
“It was great to see everything going according to schedule today. It looks like things are all on track. It’s a huge step in terms of space exploration to have a nation like the UAE taking that giant leap to send a spacecraft to Mars,” Astronomer Fred Watson said.
“Being on route to a planet like Mars is an exceptional achievement.”
A newcomer in space development, the UAE has successfully put three Earth observation satellites into orbit. Two were developed by South Korea and launched by Russia, and a third — its own — was launched by Japan.
 

A successful Hope mission to Mars would be a major step for the oil-dependent economy seeking a future in space, coming less than a year after the launch of the first UAE astronaut, Hazzaa Ali Almansoori. He spent over a week at the International Space Station last fall.
The UAE has set a goal to build a human colony on Mars by 2117.
“It sends a very strong message to the Arab youth that if the UAE is able to reach Mars in less than 50 years, they could do much more,” Omran Sharaf, the project director of Emirates Mars Mission, told The Associated Press on Sunday as his colleagues prepared for the launch.
The Emiratis involved in the program also acknowledged it represented a step forward for the Arab world, the home of mathematicians and scientists for centuries before the wars and chaos that have gripped wide swathes of it in recent times.
“So the region has been going through tough times in the past decades, if not centuries,” Sharaf said. “Now we have the case of the UAE, a country that’s moving forward with its plans, looking at the future and the future of region also.”
For its first Mars mission, the UAE chose partners instead of doing it all on its own.
“Developing a spacecraft is not easy even if there is ample funding,” said Junya Terazono, an astronomer at Aizu University.
Emirati scientists worked with researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder, University of California, Berkeley and Arizona State University. The spacecraft was assembled at Boulder and transported to Japan as the two countries looked to expand their ties with the rich and politically stable Middle Eastern nation.

The Hope Probe is ready to launch into space in a few hours..
Watch the launch LIVE: https://t.co/A0mQfe2Awh
20th July
01:58:14 AM (UAE Time)
19th July 2020
09:58:14 PM GMT#HopeMarsMission pic.twitter.com/ZU7T1FtT55

The Amal spacecraft, along with its launch, cost $200 million, according to Omran Sharaf, the UAE project manager. Operation costs at Mars have yet to be divulged.
Amal, about the size of a small car, carries three instruments to study the upper atmosphere and monitor climate change while circling the red planet for at least two years. It is set to follow up on NASA’s Maven orbiter sent to Mars in 2014 to study how it went from a warm, wet world that may have harbored microbial life during its first billion years, to the cold, barren place of today.
Hope also plans to send back images of weather changes.
Japan, a US ally, has already long collaborated in defense and space technology.

 

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Resource-poor Japan has traditionally kept friendly ties with Middle Eastern countries. In recent years, Japan has increasingly stepped up trade and defense ties with the UAE, and now seeks to expand its space business.
Two other Mars missions are planned in the coming days by the US and China. The US plans to send a rover named Perseverance to search for signs of ancient life and collect rock and soil samples for return to Earth. Liftoff is targeted for July 30. China aims to explore Mars with an orbiter and rover to study the planet’s surface, and search for water and ice. This launch is set for around July 23.
Japan has its own Mars mission planned in 2024.
Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA, plans to send a spacecraft to the Martian moon Phobos to collect samples to bring back to Earth in 2029.

 


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

Updated 8 sec ago
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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 56 min 41 sec ago
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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
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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
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‘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
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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.