BAGHDAD: A volley of rockets exploded near the US embassy in Baghdad on Sunday, as tensions mount ahead of the anniversary of the US killing of top Iranian general Qasem Soleimani.
AFP reporters in the Iraqi capital's east heard at least five booms, followed by whistling sounds.
A few moments later, they heard thunderous rapid-fire sounds and saw streams of red flares in the night sky, indicating the US embassy's C-RAM rocket defence system had been activated.
A security source told AFP at least three rockets hit near the US diplomatic mission, while two others hit separate residential neighbourhoods.
Iraq's security forces issued a statement saying the attacks caused material damage, but no casualties.
The attack is the third on US military and diplomatic installations since a truce in October largely put an end to a year of rocket and roadside bomb attacks on foreign installations across Iraq.
The first, on November 17, saw a volley of rockets slam into the US embassy and various parts of the Iraqi capital, killing one young woman.
On December 10, two convoys transporting logistical equipment for the US-led coalition helping Iraqi troops fight militants were targeted with roadside bombs.
The attacks have been claimed by groups that both US and Iraqi officials have described as smokescreens for well-known Iran-aligned armed factions in Iraq.
Tensions have been high ahead of January 3 anniversary of the 2019 US drone strike in Baghdad that killed Soleimani and leading Iraqi paramilitary figure Abu Mahdi Al-Muhandis.
The US diplomatic mission has already partially withdrawn its staff due to security concerns, two senior Iraqi officials told AFP earlier this month.
They described the move as a "minor drawdown based on security reservations from the US side," and said it was not a rupture of diplomatic ties.
Iraqi and Western officials see a turbulent few weeks ahead of the White House handover from President Donald Trump, who has pursued a "maximum pressure" policy against Iran that has also squeezed its allies next door in Iraq.
They did not rule out last-minute military action by the Trump administration on Iranian interests in Iraq, or a possible escalation by Iran-backed groups around Baghdad.
Rockets hit near US embassy in Iraq as tensions flare
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Rockets hit near US embassy in Iraq as tensions flare
- Sirens blared from the embassy compound inside the zone, which houses government buildings and foreign missions
- An anti-rocket system set up to defend the US Embassy fired and diverted one of the rockets
Unexploded ordnance killing Syria’s children at ‘alarming rate’: UN
- UNICEF warned that Syria’s girls and boys “continue to suffer the brutal impact of unexploded ordnance at an alarming rate
- UNICEF communications manager for emergencies Ricardo Pires said: “Across Syria, children face this lurking, often invisible, and extremely deadly threat“
GENEVA: More than 100 children were killed or wounded in Syria last month alone after setting off mines and other unexploded ordnance littering the country after nearly 14 years of civil war, the UN said Tuesday.
The United Nations children’s agency UNICEF warned that Syria’s girls and boys “continue to suffer the brutal impact of unexploded ordnance at an alarming rate.”
Such ordnance, dubbed UXOs, are explosive weapons such as bombs, shells, grenades, land mines and cluster munitions, that did not explode when they were deployed and remain a risk, sometimes for decades.
In December alone, as Syria was rocked by dramatic political upheaval following the sudden ousting of strongman Bashar Assad, UNICEF said it received reports of 116 children killed or injured by UXOs.
That is “an average of nearly four per day,” UNICEF communications manager for emergencies Ricardo Pires told reporters in Geneva, speaking via videolink from Damascus, adding that “this is believed to be an underestimate.”
“Across Syria, children face this lurking, often invisible, and extremely deadly threat.”
Nearly 14 years of brutal civil war, which killed more than 500,000 people and displaced millions, has left an estimated 324,000 pieces of unexploded ordnance scattered across Syria, Pires said.
“Over the past nine years, at least 422,000 incidents involving UXOs were reported in 14 governorates across the country,” he said, adding that half of those were “estimated to have ended in tragic child casualties.”
He warned that the danger had been worsened with renewed displacement since Islamist-led rebels last November 27 launched the offensive that would overthrow Assad just 11 days later.
Since then, he pointed out, “over a quarter of a million children were forced to flee their homes due to escalating conflict.”
“For these children, and those trying to return to their original areas, the peril of UXO is constant and unavoidable,” he said.
UNICEF stressed the need to dramatically scale up explosive clearance.
“It is imperative that immediate investment takes place to ensure the ground is safe and clear of explosives,” Pires said, warning that some five million children currently live in contaminated areas.
“It’s the main cause of child casualties in Syria right now,” he warned.
“Every step they take carries the risk of an unimaginable tragedy.”
UNICEF spokesman James Elder said an investment of only a few tens of millions of dollars would be enough to make a huge difference.
It “would save thousands of lives and will be an absolutely imperative part if Syria is to again become a middle income country,” he told reporters.
“It’s a very cheap price that needs to be paid.”
Second Israeli far-right minister opposes Gaza deal
JERUSALEM: A key far-right member of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government on Tuesday became the second minister to publicly oppose a Gaza truce deal but said he would not topple the ruling coalition.
“The deal is truly catastrophic,” National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir said on his Telegram channel.
“This effectively erases the hard-won achievements of the war, which have been earned at the great cost of the blood of our soldiers in Gaza.
“It is a conscious decision to pay the price with the lives of many other Israeli citizens, who will, unfortunately, bear the burden of this deal,” Ben Gvir added.
Ben Gvir, an outspoken member of Netanyahu’s government, has steadfastly opposed halting the war in Gaza.
He is the second minister to publicly reject a deal being negotiated in Doha between Israel and Hamas through international mediators.
On Monday, far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich also opposed any agreement that would halt the war.
These stances highlight sharp divides in the ruling coalition.
Netanyahu could nonetheless muster enough support to pass the deal through his cabinet, even without their backing.
He is assured of receiving majority votes in the 34-member cabinet supporting the deal, even if Ben Gvir and Smotrich, who together control six ministers, vote against it.
Israel’s main opposition leader, Yair Lapid, has also publicly said he would back Netanyahu to ensure the government does not collapse if Ben Gvir and Smotrich withdraw.
“He doesn’t need them... I offered him a political safety net for a hostage deal,” Lapid said on Monday.
Ben Gvir said he and Smotrich had tried to block the deal for a year.
“Over the past year, through our political power, we have managed to block this deal from being executed time and again,” he said.
“However, new elements have since joined the government and now support the deal, leaving us no longer a decisive force.”
He urged Smotrich to join him in opposing what he described as a “disastrous deal.”
He said the two could make “a clear statement to the prime minister that if this deal proceeds, we will withdraw from the government.”
However, the two would not seek to bring down the government, he said.
“I emphasize that even if we find ourselves in the opposition, we will not topple Netanyahu,” he said.
“However, this step is our only chance to prevent the deal from being executed and to stop Israel’s capitulation to Hamas after more than a year of bloody war.”
Gaza, Lebanon conflicts see civilian casualties at highest point in over a decade
- Israeli military action responsible for more than half of all non-combatants killed or injured in bombings and explosions in 2024
- Last year saw casualty figures increase globally by more than two-thirds, with airstrikes the leading cause of death and injury
LONDON: The number of civilian casualties worldwide caused by bombings or explosions during conflicts has reached its highest point in over a decade, driven in particular by Israel’s campaigns in Gaza and Lebanon.
The monitoring group Action on Armed Violence said it had identified 61,353 non-combatants killed or wounded in 2024, up 67 percent on 2023. Of those figures, 25,116 were fatalities, a 51 percent increase.
AOAV said Israeli military activity in Gaza and Lebanon was responsible for 55 percent of all civilians killed or wounded by explosions, at 33,910 people.
Gaza alone accounted for 39 percent of all casualties recorded, with 14,435 killed in explosions and 9,314 injured.
The civil war in Sudan has also contributed to the uptick in numbers, as well as 11,693 civilians killed or wounded by explosions in the war between Russia and Ukraine.
Spikes in casualties between 2013 and 2017 were due to the conflict in Syria, but the 2024 total was more than double that previous high-water mark.
The top cause of death and injury from explosions in 2024 was airstrikes — a tactic Israel has used extensively in Gaza and Lebanon.
The number of casualties caused this way more than doubled from 2023, with 30,804 people affected.
AOAV Executive Director Iain Overton said: “2024 has been a catastrophic year for civilians caught in explosive violence, particularly in Gaza, Ukraine and Lebanon. The international community cannot ignore the scale of harm caused.”
The true number of people affected by bombings and explosions is likely to be far higher, as AOAV bases its figures on English-language accounts of incidents.
For instance, where AOAV was only able to verify 14,435 people killed by explosions in Gaza, local health authorities put the number at 23,600.
A report last week in medical journal The Lancet estimated that casualties in Gaza in 2024 could be as much as 40 percent higher than those reported by the enclave’s authorities.
After economic meltdown and war with Israel, Lebanon’s new prime minister vows to rebuild
- After the meeting, Salam said he will not marginalize any side in Lebanon, an apparent reference to the Hezbollah militant group
- He said that he will work on spreading the state’s authority on all parts of the country
BEIRUT: Lebanon’s prime minister-designate vowed Tuesday to work on building a modern state in the crisis-hit country, saying his priorities will be to rebuild the destruction caused by a yearlong war with Israel and work on pulling the small nation out of its historic economic meltdown.
Nawaf Salam spoke after meeting with Lebanon’s new President Joseph Aoun, who himself took office last week. With the nomination of Salam and confirmation of Aoun, Lebanon, which has been run by a caretaker administration, now has a new government in waiting for the first time in two years.
After the meeting, Salam said he will not marginalize any side in Lebanon, an apparent reference to the Hezbollah militant group, which in past years opposed his appointment as prime minister and this year indicated its preference for another candidate.
Hezbollah has been weakened by its 14-month war with Israel, which ended in late November when a US-brokered 60-day ceasefire went into effect. The war left 4,000 people dead and more than 16,000 wounded and caused destruction totaling hundreds of millions of dollars.
Salam, who is currently the head of the International Court of Justice, said that he will work on spreading the state’s authority on all parts of the country. On Monday he won the support of a majority of legislators, after which Aoun formally asked him to form a new government.
Over the past years, Hezbollah and its allies have blocked Salam from becoming prime minister, casting him as a US-backed candidate.
“The time has come to say, enough. Now is the time to start a new chapter,” Salam said adding that people in Lebanon have suffered badly because of “the latest brutal Israeli aggression on Lebanon and because of the worst economic crisis and financial policies that made the Lebanese poor.”
Decades of corruption and political paralysis have left Lebanon’s banks barely functional, while electricity services are almost entirely in the hands of private diesel-run generator owners and fuel suppliers. In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic further battered the economy, and the Beirut port explosion, one of the largest non-nuclear blasts ever recorded, badly damaged several neighborhoods in the heart of the capital.
Salam vowed to fully implement the UN Security Council resolution related to the Israel-Hezbollah war which states that Israel should withdraw its troops from southern Lebanon and Hezbollah should not have an armed presence close to the border with Israel.
The premier added that he will work on spreading state authority on all parts of Lebanon through “its forces.”
Salam said he will work on putting a program to build a modern economy that would help the country of 6 million people, including 1 million Syrian refugees, out of its economic crisis that exploded into protests in October 2019.
Since the economic crisis began, successive governments have done little to implement reforms demanded by the international community that would lead to the release of billions of dollars of investments and loans by foreign donors.
“Both my hands are extended to all of you so that we all move forward in the mission of salvation, reforms and reconstruction,” Salam said.
Neither Salam nor Aoun, an army commander who was elected president last week, is considered part of the political class the ruled the country after the end of the 1975-90 civil war.
Sudan rescuers say more than 120 killed by shelling around capital
- Fighting between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has escalated in recent weeks after more than 20 months of war in Sudan
Port Sudan: Sudanese volunteer rescuers said shelling of an area of Omdurman, the capital Khartoum’s twin city just across the Nile River, killed more than 120 people.
The “random shelling” on Monday in western Omdurman resulted in the deaths of 120 civilians, said the Ombada Emergency Response Room, part of a network of volunteer rescuers across the war-torn country.
The network described the toll as preliminary and did not specify who was behind the attack.
The rescuers said medical supplies were in critically short supply as health workers struggled to treat “a large number of wounded people suffering from varying degrees of injuries.”
Fighting between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has escalated in recent weeks after more than 20 months of war in Sudan.
Tens of thousands of people have been killed in the war which has left the country on the brink of famine, according to aid agencies.
Both the army and the RSF have been accused of targeting civilians, including health workers, and indiscriminately shelling residential areas.
Most of Omdurman is under army control while the RSF holds the capital and part of the greater Khartoum area.
Residents on both sides of the Nile have reported shelling across the river, with bombs and shrapnel regularly striking homes and civilians.
