NEW YORK: With just days to go before the UN mandate for cross-border humanitarian assistance to Syria expires, the spotlight is on Russia amid fears of a Security Council showdown between Moscow and the West.
“It’s life-and-death issues we’re dealing with here,” said Ireland’s permanent representative to the UN, Geraldine Byrne Nason, who together with Norwegian counterpart Mona Juul are co-penholders of the file on the humanitarian situation in Syria. The penholder role refers to the member of the council that leads the negotiation and drafting of resolutions on a particular issue.
Nason and Juul have drafted a resolution to extend the cross-border mandate. They want the one remaining aid corridor through Bab Al-Hawa on the border with Turkey to remain open, and in addition to reopen Al-Yarubiya crossing on the border with Iraq.
“We’ve made the evidence-based arguments for months, together,” Nason told reporters at the UN headquarters in New York, where the Security Council on Tuesday met to discuss the issue behind closed doors.
“We’ve talked to every single member of the council, individually and collectively, and we’re making good headway, I think, and we’re hoping to see successful renewal later this week.”
Juul acknowledged that the debate within the Security Council on the issue “will get even more intense” in the run-up to July 10, when members will decide whether to reauthorize UN access to Bab Al-Hawa.
Cross-border aid provides a critical lifeline for millions of Syrians in the northwest of the war-torn country, as part of a massive international humanitarian response.
Ramesh Rajasingham, the UN’s acting humanitarian chief said a failure to extend the mandate “would disrupt lifesaving aid to 3.4 million people in need across the northwest, millions of whom are among the most vulnerable in Syria.”
He added: “A cross-line operation would provide a vital addition to the cross-border lifeline but it could by no means replace it. Even if deployed regularly, cross-line convoys could not replicate the size and scope of the cross-border operations.”
Cross-line operations refer to internal shipments of aid from Damascus to rebel-held parts of the country, whereas cross-border aid is shipped direct to those areas by other nations.
The Security Council approved four border crossings when international aid deliveries to Syria began in 2014. In January 2020 Russia used its veto power to force the closure of all but one. Moscow argues that the international aid operation violates the Syrian sovereignty and territorial integrity.
Vassily Nebenzia, Russia’s ambassador to the UN, said that Syria has been “liberated” and so all aid destined for the north should go through the capital, Damascus.
But aid agencies have said that humanitarian assistance delivered to Damascus does not reach areas that oppose Bashar Assad’s regime, which is accused of withholding basic goods and services, including food and clean water, from millions of Syrians as a tool of war.
Nebenzia, however, blamed the deteriorating humanitarian situation on the West’s “illegal economic sanctions (and its) continuing attempt to oust the legal authorities of the country through economic suffocation.”
During a side event at the UN on Tuesday about humanitarian assistance to Syria, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the American ambassador to the organization, said: “There is no substitute for cross-border aid. We only have four days to ensure that this literal lifeline to women and children does not get shut down.
“And as a mother and as a grandmother, I cannot imagine what it would be like to be not able to provide food, healthcare and shelter to my own children and grandchildren.
“I also can’t imagine what it is like for us not to make that decision that we have to make. And that is what we have to do in the council over the next three-to-four days.”
Thomas-Greenfield implored member states and aid agencies to “engage council members, both in New York and in capitals, to urge them to vote for the renewal and to vote for the expansion.”
The US is the single largest humanitarian donor to Syria. Although the Biden administration has been cautious about articulating any clear goals for Syria, it has treated the humanitarian issue as non-negotiable.
Maintaining the flow of aid into Syria was one of the key requests President Joe Biden made during his meeting last month with Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin. The imminent vote at the Security Council is therefore seen as a test of Biden’s efforts to ease tensions between Washington and Moscow, which are more strained than they have been for years.
Jomana Qaddour, a non-resident fellow at international affairs think tank the Atlantic Council, told Arab News that Washington is not approaching the humanitarian issue in Syria as a negotiation in which it will make “concessions in exchange for what the US believes is common sense.”
She added: “Of course, this is not how Putin perceives it. The Russians have used every step as a platform for concessions from the US and European allies, specifically as it relates to files that (Moscow) knows are a headache for the Biden administration, such as (international) sanctions (on the Syrian regime), normalization (of relations with Damascus), and reconstruction aid.
“These are really the top priorities for Russia, and it is going to use every opportunity to gain concessions from the US and Europe to achieve progress on those fronts.”
Nason and Juul remain focused on the aid issue.
“We understand it’s politically sensitive (but) we’re making a purely humanitarian case,” said Nason.
Juul added: “It’s hard to believe that we will not be able to continue this massive aid operation, which is probably the biggest in the world right now and the most scrutinized and organized of all operations.”
Qaddour laments the fact that the international view of the Syrian conflict seems to have been reduced to this narrow focus on the continued delivery of humanitarian aid while other crucial issues — such as the thousands of detainees and forcibly disappeared people, and the return of refugees — are being ignored.
“For all of us who have been working on Syria, it is incredibly frustrating to see all our energy every year spent on renewing what I think should be a no-brainer,” she said.
“I would love for that to be settled once and for all, so that we can actually focus on some of the root causes of the Syrian conflict that prevent the country and its people from living normal, stable and peaceful lives that provide them with some sense of justice, so that they can move on and rebuild.”
Threat to flow of aid to Syria is a ‘life-and-death’ issue
https://arab.news/pamfv
Threat to flow of aid to Syria is a ‘life-and-death’ issue
- A Security Council vote on renewing UN mandate for cross-border humanitarian assistance is due July 10; Irish envoy says millions depend on it to survive
- Pressure is mounting on Russia to allow flow of aid to continue but Moscow believes it should all go through the regime in Damascus
Italy protests to Israel over unexploded shell hitting Italian base in Lebanon
- Tajani said the safety of the soldiers in UNIFIL had to be ensured and stressed “the unacceptability” of the attacks
- The Italian statement said Saar had “guaranteed an immediate investigation” into the shell incident
ROME: Italy on Friday said an unexploded artillery shell hit the base of the Italian contingent in the UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon and Israel promised to investigate.
Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani spoke with Israeli counterpart Gideon Saar and protested Israeli attacks against its personnel and infrastructure in the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon, an Italian statement said.
Tajani said the safety of the soldiers in UNIFIL had to be ensured and stressed “the unacceptability” of the attacks.
The Italian statement said Saar had “guaranteed an immediate investigation” into the shell incident.
Established by a UN Security Council resolution in 2006, the 10,000-strong UN mission is stationed in southern Lebanon to monitor hostilities along the “blue line” separating Lebanon from Israel.
Since Israel launched a ground campaign in Lebanon against Hezbollah fighters at the end of September, UNIFIL has accused the Israel Defense Forces of deliberately attacking its bases, including by shooting at peacekeepers and destroying watch towers.
Lebanon rescuer picks up ‘pieces’ of father after Israel strike
- Karkaba then rushed back to the bombed civil defense center to search for her fellow first responders under the rubble
- Israel struck the center, the main civil defense facility in the eastern Baalbek area, while nearly 20 rescuers were still inside
DOURIS, Lebanon: Suzanne Karkaba and her father Ali were both civil defense rescuers whose job was to save the injured and recover the dead in Lebanon’s war.
When an Israeli strike killed him on Thursday and it was his turn to be rescued, there wasn’t much left. She had to identify him by his fingers.
Karkaba then rushed back to the bombed civil defense center to search for her fellow first responders under the rubble.
Israel struck the center, the main civil defense facility in the eastern Baalbek area, while nearly 20 rescuers were still inside, said Samir Chakia, a local official with the agency.
At least 14 civil defense workers were killed, he said.
“My dad was sleeping here with them. He helped people and recovered bodies to return them to their families... But now it’s my turn to pick up the pieces of my dad,” Karkaba told AFP with tears in her eyes.
Unlike many first-responder facilities previously targeted during the war, this facility in Douris, on the edge of Baalbek city, was state-run and had no political affiliation.
Israel’s military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Friday morning, dozens of rescuers and residents were still rummaging through the wreckage of the center. Two excavators pulled broken slabs of concrete, twisted metal bars and red tiles.
Wearing her civil defense uniform at the scene, Karkaba said she had been working around-the-clock since Israel ramped up its air raids on Lebanon’s east in late September.
“I don’t know who to grieve anymore, the (center’s) chief, my father, or my friends of 10 years,” Karkaba said, her braided hair flowing in the wind.
“I don’t have the heart to leave the center, to leave the smell of my father... I’ve lost a part of my soul.”
Beginning on September 23, Israel escalated its air raids mainly on Hezbollah strongholds in east and south Lebanon, as well as south Beirut after nearly a year of cross-border exchanges of fire.
A week later Israel sent in ground troops to southern Lebanon.
More than 150 rescuers, most of them affiliated with Hezbollah and its allies, have been killed in more than a year of clashes, according to health ministry figures from late October.
Friday morning, rescuers in Douris were still pulling body parts from the rubble, strewn with dozens of paper documents, while Lebanese army troops stood guard near the site.
Civil defense worker Mahmoud Issa was among those searching for friends in the rubble.
“Does it get worse than this kind of strike against rescue teams and medics? We are among the first to... save people. But now, we are targets,” he said.
On Thursday, Lebanon’s health ministry said more than 40 people had been killed in Israeli strikes on the country’s south and east.
The ministry reported two deadly Israeli raids on emergency facilities in less than two hours that day: the one near Baalbek, and another on the south that killed four Hezbollah-affiliated paramedics.
The ministry urged the international community to “put an end to these dangerous violations.”
More than 3,400 people have been killed in Lebanon since the clashes began last year, according to the ministry, the majority of them since late September.
Iran backs Lebanon in ceasefire talks, seeks end to ‘problems’
- World powers say Lebanon ceasefire must be based on UN Security Council Resolution 1701
- Israel demands the freedom to act should Hezbollah violate any agreement, which Lebanon has rejected
BEIRUT: Iran backs any decision taken by Lebanon in talks to secure a ceasefire with Israel, a senior Iranian official said on Friday, signalling Tehran wants to see an end to a conflict that has dealt heavy blows to its Lebanese ally Hezbollah.
Israel launched airstrikes in the Hezbollah-controlled southern suburbs of Beirut, flattening buildings for a fourth consecutive day. Israel has stepped up its bombardment of the area this week, an escalation that has coincided with signs of movement in US-led diplomacy toward a ceasefire.
Two senior Lebanese political sources told Reuters that the US ambassador to Lebanon had presented a draft ceasefire proposal to Lebanon’s parliament speaker Nabih Berri the previous day. Berri is endorsed by Hezbollah to negotiate and met the senior Iranian official Ali Larijani on Friday.
Asked at a news conference whether he had come to Beirut to undermine the US truce plan, Larijani said: “We are not looking to sabotage anything. We are after a solution to the problems.”
“We support in all circumstances the Lebanese government. Those who are disrupting are Netanyahu and his people,” Larijani added, referring to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Hezbollah was founded by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards in 1982, and has been armed and financed by Tehran.
A senior diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, assessed that more time was needed to get a ceasefire done but was hopeful it could be achieved.
The outgoing US administration appears keen to secure a ceasefire in Lebanon, even as efforts to end Israel’s related war in the Gaza Strip appear totally adrift.
World powers say a Lebanon ceasefire must be based on UN Security Council Resolution 1701 which ended a previous 2006 war between Hezbollah and Israel. Its terms require Hezbollah to move weapons and fighters north of the Litani river, which runs some 20 km (30 miles) north of the border.
Israel demands the freedom to act should Hezbollah violate any agreement, which Lebanon has rejected.
In a meeting with Larijani, Lebanon’s caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati urged support for Lebanon’s position on implementing 1701 and called this a priority, along with halting the “Israeli aggression,” a statement from his office said.
Larijani stressed “that Iran supports any decision taken by the government, especially resolution 1701,” the statement said.
Israel launched its ground and air offensive against Hezbollah in late September after almost a year of cross-border hostilities in parallel with the Gaza war. It says it aims to secure the return home of tens of thousands of Israelis, forced to evacuate from northern Israel under Hezbollah fire.
Israel’s campaign has forced more than 1 million Lebanese to flee their homes, igniting a humanitarian crisis.
FLATTENED BUILDINGS
It has dealt Hezbollah serious blows, killing its leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah and other commanders. Hezbollah has kept up rocket attacks into Israel and its fighters have been battling Israeli troops in the south.
On Friday, Israeli airstrikes flattened five more buildings in Beirut’s southern suburbs known as Dahiyeh. One of them was located near one of Beirut’s busiest traffic junctions, Tayouneh, in an area where Dahiyeh meets other parts of Beirut.
The sound of an incoming missile could be heard in footage showing the airstrike near Tayouneh. The targeted building turned into a cloud of rubble and debris which billowed into the adjacent Horsh Beirut, the city’s main park.
The Israeli military said its fighter jets attacked munitions warehouses, a headquarters and other Hezbollah infrastructure. Ahead of the latest airstrikes, the Israeli military issued a warning on social media identifying buildings.
The European Union strongly condemned the killing of 12 paramedics in an Israeli strike near Baalbek in the Bekaa Valley on Thursday, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said.
“Attacks on health care workers and facilities are a grave violation of international humanitarian law,” he wrote on X.
On Thursday, Eli Cohen, Israel’s energy minister and a member of its security cabinet, told Reuters prospects for a ceasefire were the most promising since the conflict began.
The Washington Post reported that Netanyahu was rushing to advance a Lebanon ceasefire with the aim of delivering an early foreign policy win to his ally US President-elect Donald Trump.
According to Lebanon’s health ministry, Israeli attacks have killed at least 3,386 people through Wednesday since Oct. 7, 2023, the vast majority of them since late September. It does not distinguish between civilian casualties and fighters.
Hezbollah attacks have killed about 100 civilians and soldiers in northern Israel, the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights and southern Lebanon over the last year, according to Israel.
French anti-terrorism prosecutor to appeal against Lebanese militant’s release
- Georges Ibrahim Abdallah, a former head of the Lebanese Armed Revolutionary Brigade, would be released on Dec. 6
- Requests for Abdallah’s release have been rejected and annulled multiple times
PARIS: The office of France’s anti-terrorism prosecutor said on Friday it would appeal against a French court’s decision to grant the release of a Lebanese militant jailed for attacks on US and Israeli diplomats in France in the early 1980s.
PNAT said Georges Ibrahim Abdallah, a former head of the Lebanese Armed Revolutionary Brigade, would be released on Dec. 6 under the court’s decision on condition that he leave France and not return.
Abdallah was given a life sentence in 1987 for his role in the murders of US diplomat Charles Ray in Paris and Israeli diplomat Yacov Barsimantov in 1982, and in the attempted murder of US Consul General Robert Homme in Strasbourg in 1984.
Representatives for the embassies of the United States and Israel, as well as the Ministry of Justice, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Requests for Abdallah’s release have been rejected and annulled multiple times, including in 2003, 2012 and 2014.
A French student who was arrested and detained in Tunisia returns to Paris
- Victor Dupont, a Ph.D. at Aix-Marseille University’s Institute of Research and Study on the Arab and Islamic Worlds, arrived at Charles de Gaulle Airport on Friday
- Dupont, who researches social movements, youth unemployment and Tunisia’s 2011 revolution, was one of three French nationals arrested on Oct. 19
PARIS: A French student detained for weeks in Tunisia returned to Paris on Friday after weeks of top-level diplomatic discussions.
Victor Dupont, a 27-year-old completing a Ph.D. at Aix-Marseille University’s Institute of Research and Study on the Arab and Islamic Worlds, arrived at Charles de Gaulle Airport on Friday afternoon, 27 days after he was arrested in Tunis.
“Obviously, we welcome this outcome for him and, most of all, we welcome that he is able to reunite with his loved ones here in France,” French Foreign Ministry spokesman Christophe Lemoine said.
He announced the release at a ministry news briefing on Friday, saying that Dupont was freed Tuesday from prison and returned on Friday back to France.
Dupont, who researches social movements, youth unemployment and Tunisia’s 2011 revolution, was one of three French nationals arrested on Oct. 19. Authorities in recent years have arrested journalists, activists and opposition figures, but Dupont’s arrest garnered international attention and condemnation because of his nationality and because he wasn’t known as a critic of the government.
A support committee set up to advocate for Dupont’s release told The Associated Press in October that Dupont and several friends were detained in front of Dupont’s home, then taken to a police station for questioning. Dupont was later taken alone into custody and taken to appear in military court in the city of Le Kef.
The arrest provoked concerns about the safety and security of foreigners in Tunisia, where rights and freedoms have gradually been curtailed under President Kais Saied.
Dupont’s supporters, both at his university and in associations representing academics who work in the Middle East and North Africa, said that his research didn’t pose any security risks and called the charges unfounded.
In a letter to Saied and Tunisia’s Ministry of Higher Educations, associations representing French, Italian and British academics who work in the region said that Tunisia’s government had approved Dupont’s research and that the allegations against him “lack both founding and credibility.”
“We therefore condemn the extraordinary use of the military court system,” they wrote on Nov. 12.
Saied has harnessed populist anger to win two terms as president of Tunisia and reversed many of the gains that were made when the country became the first to topple a longtime dictator in 2011 during the regional uprisings that became known as the Arab Spring.
Tunisia and France have maintained close political and economic ties since Tunisia became independent after 75 years of being a French protectorate. France is Tunisia’s top trade partner, home to a large Tunisian diaspora and a key interlocutor in managing migration from North Africa to Europe.
A French diplomatic official not authorized to speak publicly about the arrest told The Associated Press in late October that officials were in contact with Tunisian authorities about the case. Another diplomatic official with knowledge of the matter said on Thursday that French President Emmanuel Macron had recently spoken to Saied twice about the case and said that it was the subject of regular calls between top level diplomats.
The others arrested along with Dupont were previously released.
