CAIRO: Sudan on Wednesday said it signed the “Abraham Accords” with the US, paving the way for the African country to normalize ties with Israel.
A statement from the office of Sudan’s prime minister said Justice Minister Nasredeen Abdulbari signed the accord Wednesday with visiting US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin.
The recent US-negotiated deals between Arab countries and Israel have been a major foreign policy achievement by President Donald Trump's administration. The deals were named the “Abraham Accords” after the biblical patriarch revered by Muslims and Jews.
The signing came just over two months after Trump announced that Sudan would start to normalize ties with Israel.
Before Sudan, the Trump administration engineered diplomatic pacts late last year between Israel and the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain — the first since Jordan recognized Israel in the 1990s and Egypt in the 1970s. Morocco also established diplomatic ties with Israel.
The US and Sudan on Wednesday agreed to settle the African’s country’s debt to the World Bank, widely seen as a key step toward the nation’s economic recovery after the 2019 overthrow of longtime autocrat Omar Al-Bashir.
The move came during Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin's visit to Khartoum, making him the first senior American official to land there since President Donald Trump’s administration removed the African country from the list of state sponsors of terrorism.
Mnuchin arrived at Khartoum’s international airport, where he received by acting Finance Minister Heba Mohammed Ali, and US Charge d’Affaires in Sudan Brian Shukan, the prime minister's office said in a statement.
It is the first visit by a sitting US treasury chief to Sudan, the statement said. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in August became the first top American diplomat to visit Sudan since 2005, when Condoleezza Rice visited. Pompeo was also the most senior US official to visit the African country since last year’s ouster of Al-Bashir.
Mnuchin's visit came after a one-day-visit to Cairo, where he met with Egypt’s President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi, a close US ally. The stops are part of a flurry of activity during the final days of the Trump administration. Democrat Joe Biden becomes president on Jan. 20.
The US treasury secretary met with Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok, and is scheduled to meet with other Sudanese leaders including Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan, head of the ruling sovereign council.
The visit came “at a time when our bilateral relations are taking historical leaps towards a better future. We’re planning to make tangible strides today as our relations enter a #NewEra,” Hamdok tweeted.
Mnuchin’s one-day visit focused on the country’s struggling economy and possible US economic assistance, including debt relief, the statement said. Sudan today has more than $60 billion in foreign debt. Relief from its arrears and access to foreign loans are widely seen as its gateway to economic recovery.
Sudan’s Finance Ministry said it inked a “memorandum of understanding” with the US treasury department to to facilitate the payment of Sudan’s arrears to the World Bank.
The ministry said the settlement would enable Sudan's government to have more than $1 billion annually from the World Bank, for the fist time since nearly three decades when Sudan was designated as pariah state. It did not provide further details.
The Justice Ministry, however, announced last month that the US would play a $1 billion bridge loan to the World Bank to help clear Sudan’s arrears with the institution, in addition to $1.1 billion direct and indirect aid from the US.
Sudan is on a fragile path to democracy after a popular uprising led the military to overthrow al-Bashir in April 2019. The county is now ruled by a joint military and civilian government that seeks better ties with Washington and the West.
The government has been struggling with a huge budget deficit and widespread shortages of essential goods, including fuel, bread and medicine.
Annual inflation soared past 200% in the past months as prices of bread and other staples surged, according to official figures.
Last month, Trump’s administration finalized the removal of Sudan from the US list of state sponsors of terrorism. The move was a key incentive for the government in Khartoum to normalize relations with Israel.
The two countries, Sudan and Israel, have agreed to have full diplomatic ties, making Sudan the third Arab state — after the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain — to move to normalize relations with Israel late last year. Morocco also established diplomatic ties with Israel.
Sudan’s economy has suffered from decades of US sanctions and mismanagement under Al-Bashir, who had ruled the country since 1989.
The designation dates back to the 1990s, when Sudan briefly hosted Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and other wanted militants. Sudan was also believed to have served as a pipeline for Iran to supply weapons to Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip.
Mnuchin’s visit came amid rising tensions between military and civilian members of Sudan’s transitional government. That tensions, which resurfaced in recent weeks, have largely centered on the Sudanese military’s economic assets, over which the civilian-run finance ministry does not have control.
John Prendergast, co-founder of The Sentry watchdog group, urged The US treasury secretary to pressure the military and security apparatus to allow “independent oversight” to businesses they control.
“As Secretary Mnuchin engages with the leadership in Khartoum, it is critical that he weighs in with strong support for international anti-money laundering standards and fiscal transparency, which are essential for Sudan to counter the looting of its national economy,” he said.
Sudan says it signed ‘Abraham Accords’ with US
https://arab.news/zyzam
Sudan says it signed ‘Abraham Accords’ with US
- The signing came just over two months after Trump announced that Sudan would normalize ties with Israel
- The US and Sudan agreed to settle the African’s country’s debt to the World Bank, widely seen as a key step toward the nation’s economic recovery
Israel’s warfare in Gaza consistent with genocide, UN committee finds
- Committee’s report states ‘Israeli officials have publicly supported policies that strip Palestinians of the very necessities required to sustain life’
- It raises ‘serious concern’ about Israel’s use of AI to choose targets ‘with minimal human oversight,’ resulting in ‘overwhelming’ casualties among women and children
NEW YORK: Israel’s methods of warfare in Gaza, including the use of starvation as a weapon, mass civilian casualties and life-threatening conditions deliberately inflicted on Palestinians in the territory, are consistent with the characteristics of genocide, the UN Special Committee to Investigate Israeli Practices said in a report published on Thursday.
“Since the beginning of the war, Israeli officials have publicly supported policies that strip Palestinians of the very necessities required to sustain life: food, water and fuel,” the committee said.
Statements from Israeli authorities and the “systematic and unlawful” blocking of humanitarian aid deliveries to Gaza make clear “Israel’s intent to instrumentalize life-saving supplies for political and military gains,” it added.
The committee, the full title of which is the UN Special Committee to Investigate Israeli Practices Affecting the Human Rights of the Palestinian people and other Arabs of the Occupied Territories, was established by the UN General Assembly in 1968 to monitor the human rights situation in the occupied Golan heights, the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip. It comprises the permanent representatives to the UN from three member states, currently Malaysia, Senegal and Sri Lanka, who are appointed by the president of the General Assembly.
Its latest report, which covers the period from October 2023 to July 2024, mostly focuses on the effects of the war in Gaza on the rights of Palestinians.
“Through its siege over Gaza, obstruction of humanitarian aid, alongside targeted attacks and killing of civilians and aid workers, despite repeated UN appeals, binding orders from the International Court of Justice and resolutions of the Security Council, Israel is intentionally causing death, starvation and serious injury, using starvation as a method of war and inflicting collective punishment on the Palestinian population,” the committee said.
The “extensive” Israeli bombing campaign has wiped out essential services in Gaza and caused an “environmental catastrophe” that will have “lasting health impacts,” it adds.
By early 2024, the report says, more than 25,000 tonnes of explosives, equivalent to two nuclear bombs, had been dropped on Gaza, causing “massive” destruction, the collapse of water and sanitation systems, agricultural devastation and toxic pollution. This has created a “lethal mix of crises that will inflict severe harm on generations to come,” the committee said.
The report notes “serious concern” about Israel’s use of artificial intelligence technology to choose its targets “with minimal human oversight,” the consequence of which has been “overwhelming” numbers of deaths of women and children. This underscores “Israel’s disregard of its obligation to distinguish between civilians and combatants and take adequate safeguards to prevent civilian deaths,” it adds.
In addition, Israel’s escalating censorship of the media and targeting of journalists are “deliberate efforts” to block global access to information, the committee found, and the report states that social media companies have disproportionately removed “pro-Palestinian content” in comparison with posts inciting violence against Palestinians.
The committee also condemned the continuing “smear campaign” and other attacks on the reputation of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, and the wider UN.
“This deliberate silencing of reporting, combined with disinformation and attacks on humanitarian workers, is a clear strategy to undermine the vital work of the UN, sever the lifeline of aid still reaching Gaza, and dismantle the international legal order,” it said.
It called on all states to honor their legal obligations to stop and prevent violations of international law by Israel, including the system of apartheid that operates in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and to hold Israeli authorities accountable for their actions.
“Upholding international law and ensuring accountability for violations rests squarely on member states,” the committee said.
Failure to do this weakens “the very core of the international legal system and sets a dangerous precedent, allowing atrocities to go unchecked.”
The committee will officially present its report to the 79th Session of the UN General Assembly on Monday.
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
- 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
- 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
- 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.
