BEIRUT: In a surprise move, the Lebanese Cabinet has canceled the school examinations for the intermediate (brevet) certificate, which were scheduled for July 6.
The decision has confused the Education Ministry, students and schools.
The Interior Ministry’s recent decision was based on “the logistical difficulties the security bodies are facing, which are preventing them from covering all the centers where official exams are held in Lebanon, including the official exams for the intermediate and high school certificates,” an official source said.
According to caretaker Education Minister Abbas Halabi, the only option was to “cancel the official exams for the intermediate certificate this year and carry out the ones for the high school certificate only.”
The official exams for the intermediate certificate are held in Lebanon and mark the end of intermediate school and the beginning of high school.
“Right now in Lebanon, the brevet certificate is the only way that allows us to assess the educational level of students transitioning from intermediate school to high school,” Halabi said.
He added that “there are Lebanese educational bodies and even political parties that consider the brevet certificate as a psychological burden for students and their parents.”
Public school students have had a tumultuous year, with their teachers striking over the soaring cost of fuel and unpaid salaries and resulting in them missing out on important lessons.
Amid the ongoing economic collapse, hundreds of Lebanese students have enrolled in public schools. Educators expect the trend to continue in the next academic year following the dollarization of private school tuition fees.
About 62,300 students were set to take the official exams, about 16,000 of them from private schools.
The number of Syrian students attending afternoon classes in public schools has reached 2,500. About 41,000 students attend private schools.
Halabi said the Cabinet had asked the Education Ministry to prepare “the appropriate mechanism to cancel the intermediate certificate,” but the ministry had yet to take the decision as it required the Cabinet’s approval.
He also criticized the Cabinet’s decision to cancel the certificate so close to their scheduled date, describing it as “a cynical way to deal with an important educational milestone.”
Halabi said that he had faced criticism from other ministers over his desire to continue with the certificate “when other countries have canceled it.”
“We have three solutions: we can either rely on school grades, subject students to a national exam carried out by schools instead of the ministry of education, which would set the questions for two or three subjects only, or give students certificates of completion, which is something we are trying to avoid, as all students, including those who didn’t study, will be promoted to the next grade.”
The minister warned against “manipulating the fate of the intermediate certificate” and added that “the number of supervisors and correctors is secured, the logistical arrangements are in place and the funding is available.”
The brevet certificate has been canceled three times since its resumption at the end of the Lebanese civil war.
In 2014, teachers boycotted the exams, resulting in their cancelation. In 2020, they were canceled because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and in 2021 it was deemed they could not be used to accurately assess students’ educational attainment because of the implementation of remote learning during the health crisis.
An educational expert, who asked not to be named, said the Cabinet’s move was “a populist political decision, through which politicians want to please their supporters.”
Such decisions had led the country to the place it was now, the person said.
The official exams for the high school certificate are scheduled for July 10.
Albert Chamoun, adviser to the education minister, told Arab News that “the number of students who will take these exams has reached 38,000, including a fair number of Syrian refugees.”
The number of refugees was higher this year than in the past, he added.
“Syrian students used to stop going to school after they finished ninth grade to join the labor market, but nowadays, there’s a portion of them who pursue their education all the way to the universities,” he said.
In the past, Syrian students have abstained from taking the official exams due to the differences in the Syrian and Lebanese curricula. But those who are sitting the exams this year arrived in Lebanon after the outbreak of the Syrian war and have been in the educational system since elementary class.
UNICEF covers the costs of these students’ education and pays the school fund $140 per child. It also covers the teachers’ fees and operational costs.
Due to the economic collapse, Lebanon has recently started borrowing money to fund its official exams.
While UNICEF has contributed to teachers’ fees for taking part in the tests, a loan from the World Bank will cover all of the other administrative and logistical expenses.
Testing times: Lebanon’s Education Ministry confused by sudden cancelation of key exams
https://arab.news/6536s
Testing times: Lebanon’s Education Ministry confused by sudden cancelation of key exams
- Intermediate certificate tests were set to take place next week
- Examinations mark end of intermediate school, beginning of high school
Syrian soldiers distance themselves from Assad in return for promised amnesty
- Lt. Col. Walid Abd Rabbo, who works with the new Interior Ministry, said the army has been dissolved and the interim government has not decided yet on whether those “whose hands are not tainted in blood” can apply to join the military again
DAMASCUS, Syria: Hundreds of former Syrian soldiers on Saturday reported to the country’s new rulers for the first time since Bashar Assad was ousted to answer questions about whether they may have been involved in crimes against civilians in exchange for a promised amnesty and return to civilian life.
The former soldiers trooped to what used to be the head office in Damascus of Assad’s Baath party that had ruled Syria for six decades. They were met with interrogators, former insurgents who stormed Damascus on Dec. 8, and given a list of questions and a registration number. They were free to leave.
Some members of the defunct military and security services waiting outside the building told The Associated Press that they had joined Assad’s forces because it meant a stable monthly income and free medical care.
The fall of Assad took many by surprise as tens of thousands of soldiers and members of security services failed to stop the advancing insurgents. Now in control of the country, and Assad in exile in Russia, the new authorities are investigating atrocities by Assad’s forces, mass graves and an array of prisons run by the military, intelligence and security agencies notorious for systematic torture, mass executions and brutal conditions.
Lt. Col. Walid Abd Rabbo, who works with the new Interior Ministry, said the army has been dissolved and the interim government has not decided yet on whether those “whose hands are not tainted in blood” can apply to join the military again. The new leaders have vowed to punish those responsible for crimes against Syrians under Assad.
Several locations for the interrogation and registration of former soldiers were opened in other parts of Syria in recent days.
“Today I am coming for the reconciliation and don’t know what will happen next,” said Abdul-Rahman Ali, 43, who last served in the northern city of Aleppo until it was captured by insurgents in early December.
“We received orders to leave everything and withdraw,” he said. “I dropped my weapon and put on civilian clothes,” he said, adding that he walked 14 hours until he reached the central town of Salamiyeh, from where he took a bus to Damascus.
Ali, who was making 700,000 pounds ($45) a month in Assad’s army, said he would serve his country again.
Inside the building, men stood in short lines in front of four rooms where interrogators asked each a list of questions on a paper.
“I see regret in their eyes,” an interrogator told AP as he questioned a soldier who now works at a shawarma restaurant in the Damascus suburb of Harasta. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not allowed to talk to media.
The interrogator asked the soldier where his rifle is and the man responded that he left it at the base where he served. He then asked for and was handed the soldier’s military ID.
“He has become a civilian,” the interrogator said, adding that the authorities will carry out their own investigation before questioning the same soldier again within weeks to make sure there are no changes in the answers that he gave on Saturday.
The interrogator said after nearly two hours that he had quizzed 20 soldiers and the numbers are expected to increase in the coming days.
Israel accuses Pope of ‘double standards’, after Gaza criticism
JERUSALEM: Israel accused Pope Francis of “double standards” Saturday after he condemned the bombing of children in Gaza as “cruelty” following an air strike that killed seven children from one family.
“The Pope’s remarks are particularly disappointing as they are disconnected from the true and factual context of Israel’s fight against jihadist terrorism — a multi-front war that was forced upon it starting on October 7,” an Israeli foreign ministry statement said.
“Enough with the double standards and the singling out of the Jewish state and its people.”
Gaza’s civil defense rescue agency had reported that an Israeli air strike killed 10 members of a family on Friday in the northern part of the Palestinian territory, including seven children.
“Yesterday they did not allow the Patriarch (of Jerusalem) into Gaza as promised. Yesterday children were bombed. This is cruelty, this is not war,” he told members of the government of the Holy See.
“I want to say it because it touches my heart.”
The Israeli statement said: “Cruelty is terrorists hiding behind children while trying to murder Israeli children; cruelty is holding 100 hostages for 442 days, including a baby and children, by terrorists and abusing them,” a reference to the Palestinian Hamas militants who attacked Israel and took hostages on October 7, 2023, triggering the Gaza war.
“Unfortunately, the Pope has chosen to ignore all of this,” the Israeli ministry said.
US military strikes Houthi targets in Yemen’s capital
- Missile storage and command/control facilities hit: CENTCOM
RIYADH: The US military command in the Middle East said on Sunday that it carried out strikes against Houthi missile storage and command-and-control facilities in Yemen’s capital, Sanaa.
“CENTCOM forces conducted the deliberate strikes to disrupt and degrade Houthi operations, such as attacks against U.S. Navy warships and merchant vessels in the Southern Red Sea, Bab al-Mandeb, and Gulf of Aden,” the command said on X, shortly after midnight local time.
The video released by the US military showed a jet taking off from a carrier.
“During the operation, CENTCOM forces also shot down multiple Houthi one way attack uncrewed aerial vehicles (OWA UAV) and an anti-ship cruise missile (ASCM) over the Red Sea.”
Videos on social media showed people fleeing large explosions in the capital, but Arab News could not immediately verify the authenticity of the footage.
The command said that US air and naval assets were used in the operation, including F/A-18s, adding the “strike reflects CENTCOM's ongoing commitment to protect U.S. and coalition personnel, regional partners, and international shipping.”
The Houthis, who control large parts of Yemen, seized the capital in 2014 and have been conducting drone and missile attacks on international shipping in the Red Sea in an effort to impose a naval blockade on Israel, who, for more than a year, has been carrying out a devastating war against Hamas in Gaza.
Earlier on Saturday, a Houthi missile hit Tel Aviv, injuring 16 people.
Syria’s SDF says five fighters killed in strikes by Turkish-backed forces
- Turkiye regards the PKK, YPG and SDF as terrorist groups
CAIRO: The US-allied Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said five of its fighters had been killed on Saturday in attacks by Turkish-backed forces on the city of Manbij in northern Syria.
Fighting in Manbij broke out after Bashar Assad was toppled nearly two weeks ago, with Turkiye and the Syrian armed groups it supports seizing control of the city from the Kurdish-led SDF on Dec. 9.
The SDF, an ally in the US coalition against Daesh militants, is spearheaded by the YPG — a group that Ankara sees as an extension of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants who have fought the Turkish state for 40 years.
Turkiye regards the PKK, YPG and SDF as terrorist groups.
The United States has been mediating to stop fighting between Turkiye and the Syrian Arab groups it supports, and the SDF.
The US State Department said on Wednesday a ceasefire around Manbij had been extended until the end of the week, but a Turkish defense ministry official said a day later there was no talk of a ceasefire deal with the SDF.
In Israeli-occupied south Syria, villagers feel abandoned
- Most villagers have cloistered themselves inside their homes since the troops arrived. A few look on through windows and from rooftops
QUNEITRA, Syria: In the towns and villages of southern Syria that Israel has occupied since the overthrow of longtime strongman Bashar Assad, soldiers and residents size each other up from a distance.
The main street of the village of Jabata Al-Khashab is largely deserted as a foot patrol of Israeli troops passes through it.
Most villagers have cloistered themselves inside their homes since the troops arrived. A few look on through windows and from rooftops.
It is the same story in nearby Baath City, named for the now suspended political party that ran Syria for more than 60 years until Assad’s ouster by Islamist-led rebels earlier this month.
The town’s main street has been heavily damaged by the passage of a column of Israeli tanks.
The street furniture has been reduced to mangled metal, aand broken off branches from roadside trees litter the highway.
“Look at all the destruction the Israeli tanks have caused to our streets and road signs,” said 51-year-old doctor Arsan Arsan.
“People around here are very angry about the Israeli incursion. We are for peace, but on condition that Israel pulls back to the armistice line.”
Israel announced on December 8 that its troops were crossing the armistice line and were occupying the UN-patrolled buffer zone that has separated Israeli and Syrian forces on the strategic Golan Heights since 1974.
The announcement, which was swiftly condemned by the United Nations, came the same day that the rebels entered Damascus.
Israel said it was a defensive measure prompted by the security vacuum created by the Assad government’s abrupt collapse.
Israeli troops swiftly occupied much of the buffer zone, including the summit of Syria’s highest peak, Mount Hermon.
The Israeli military has since confirmed that its troops have also been operating beyond the buffer zone in other parts of southwest Syria.
At a security briefing on Mount Hermon on Tuesday, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz spoke of the importance of “completing preparations... for the possibility of a prolonged presence” in the buffer zone.
He added that the 2,814-meter (9,232-foot) peak provided “observation and deterrence” against both Hezbollah in Lebanon and the new authorities in Damascus who “claim to present a moderate front but are affiliated with the most extreme Islamist factions.”
Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS), the Islamist group that led the rebel overthrow of Assad, has its roots in Al-Qaeda and remains proscribed as a terrorist organization by several Western governments, even though it has sought to moderate its image in recent years.
On the road south from Damascus to the provincial capital Quneitra, an AFP correspondent saw no sign of the transitional government or its fighters. All of the checkpoints that had controlled access to the province for decades lay abandoned.
Quneitra’s streets too were largely deserted as residents stayed indoors, peeking out only occasionally at passing Israeli patrols.
Israeli soldiers have raised the Star of David on several hilltops overlooking the town.
HTS leader Ahmed Al-Sharaa has said that Israel’s crossing of the armistice line on the Golan “threatens a new unjustified escalation in the region.”
But he added in a statement late last week that “the general exhaustion in Syria after years of war and conflict does not allow us to enter new conflicts.”
That position has left many in the south feeling abandoned to fend for themselves.
“We are just 400 meters (yards) from the Israeli tanks... the children are scared by the incursion,” said Yassin Al-Ali, who lives on the edge of the village of Al-Hamidiyah, not far from Baath City.
He said that instead of celebrating their victory in Damascus, the transitional government and its fighters should come to the aid of Quneitra province.
“What’s happening here really should make those celebrating in Umayyad Square pause for a moment... and come here to support us in the face of the Israeli occupation,” Ali said.
