DUBAI: Iran denied Israeli claims that it was involved in the seizure of a British-owned and Japanese-operated cargo ship in the southern Red Sea by Yemen’s Houthis, foreign ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani said on Monday at a press conference.
“We have said multiple times that resistance groups in the region act independently and spontaneously based on their interests and that of their people,” Kanaani said, adding that Israeli claims were aimed at diverting attention away from Israeli’s “irreparable defeat” in its battle against Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip.
On Sunday, Israel said the incident was an “Iranian act of terrorism” with consequences for international maritime security.
The Houthis, an ally of Tehran, have been launching long-range missile and drone salvoes at Israel in solidarity with the Palestinian Hamas militants fighting in Gaza.
Iran denies involvement in Red Sea ship seizure by Yemen’s Houthis
https://arab.news/nwsx7
Iran denies involvement in Red Sea ship seizure by Yemen’s Houthis
- Foreign affairs ministry spokesman: Israeli claims aimed at diverting attention away from Israeli’s ‘irreparable defeat’ in its battle against Hamas militants
Army surrounds South Sudan’s vice president’s home as his allies are arrested
- Vice President Riek Machar said last month that the firing of several of his allies from posts in the government threatened the 2018 peace deal
Machar, whose political rivalry with President Salva Kiir has in the past exploded into civil war, said last month that the firing of several of his allies from posts in the government threatened the 2018 peace deal between him and Kiir that ended a five-year civil war in which more than 400,000 people were killed.
Deputy army chief Gen. Gabriel Duop Lam, also loyal to Machar, was detained Tuesday over the fighting in the north, while Machar ally and Petroleum Minister Puot Kang Chol was arrested Wednesday alongside his bodyguards and family. No reason was given for the arrests.
Neither Machar nor his SPLM-IO party have commented about the fighting, but Water Minister Pal Mai Deng, who is also the party’s spokesperson, said Lam’s detention “puts the entire peace agreement at risk.”
Western envoys last week urged leaders to de-escalate the tension.
Ter Manyang Gatwich, Executive Director of the Center for Peace and Advocacy, has called for the immediate release of those detained to avert further escalation of violence and further bloodshed from degenerating into what he called a “full-scale war.”
South Sudan is yet to fully implement the 2018 peace agreement and elections that were scheduled for last year were postponed by two years due to a lack of funds.
Tunisia puts 40 opposition figures on trial
- The charges include plotting against state security and belonging to a terrorist group for some, while others are suspected of illegal connections with foreign parties and diplomats
TUNIS: A Tunisian court opened a high-profile trial Tuesday in which 40 people, including leading opposition figures, stand accused of conspiring against state security. Activists protested outside, calling it a baseless case and part of a politically driven crackdown.
Nine of the defendants were not allowed to appear at the trial, deemed by the court as too dangerous to release from custody. Their lawyers demanded the right of their clients to appear before a judge, as did the protesters outside.
In addition to opposition politicians, the accused include former diplomats, business leaders, journalists, lawyers and human rights defenders, and some have spent more than two years in pre-trial detention. Others have fled abroad.
According to lawyers, some defendants risk capital punishment if convicted. The charges include plotting against state security and belonging to a terrorist group for some, while others are suspected of illegal connections with foreign parties and diplomats.
Critics of Tunisian President Kais Saied say the charges are fabricated and the trial is politically motivated. The North African country’s president, who was re-elected for a second term last year, says the defendants are “traitors and terrorists,” as they accuse him of staging a coup in 2021.
The birthplace of the Arab Spring pro-democracy uprisings, Tunisia has seen a significant rollback of freedoms under Saied. Critics, including the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, have accused Saied’s government of using the judiciary to stifle dissent since his 2021 power grab, which dissolved parliament and expanded executive authority.
Saied’s supporters argue his crackdowns are necessary to stabilize a nation grappling with inflation, unemployment, and corruption. Many Tunisians blame political elites for economic mismanagement.
Global rights groups condemned the court case, including treatment of the defendants.
“The documented systematic violations of their rights during the pre-trial phase of the criminal proceedings significantly undermine the whole prosecution and the legitimacy, independence and impartiality″ of the trial, the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) said in a statement.
Syria FM says joining meeting of chemical weapons watchdog
DAMASCUS: Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad Al-Shaibani said he would take part in a meeting Wednesday of the international chemical weapons watchdog in the Netherlands, nearly three months after Bashar Assad’s ouster.
“Today, for the first time in Syria’s history, I am attending the executive council of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons in The Hague,” Shaibani said in a statement on X.
“This participation reaffirms Syria’s commitment to international security and honors those who lost their lives suffocating at the hands of the Assad regime,” he added.
Assad was repeatedly accused of using chemical weapons during Syria’s 13-year civil war, and there has been widespread concern about the fate of Syria’s stockpile since his December 8 ouster.
More than a decade ago, Syria agreed to hand over its declared stockpile for destruction, but the OPCW has always been concerned that the declaration was incomplete and that more weapons remain unaccounted for.
Last month, OPCW chief Fernando Arias met Syria’s new leader Ahmed Al-Sharaa in a first visit to Damascus since Islamist-led rebels toppled Assad.
The visit raised hope that Syria could be definitively rid of chemical weapons after years of obstruction to the organization’s work.
Arias said that his trip marked “a reset” and that “after 11 years of obstruction by the previous authorities, the Syrian caretaker authorities have a chance to turn the page.”
The OPCW has expressed concern that valuable evidence may have been destroyed in the intense Israeli bombing of Syrian military assets that followed Assad’s overthrow.
Israel has said suspected chemical weapons sites were among its targets as it sought to stop the assets from falling into the hands of “extremists.”
Amnesty says Israeli attacks on Lebanon health sector should be probed as war crimes
- Amnesty said it investigated four Israeli attacks on health facilities and vehicles in Beirut and south Lebanon from October 3 to 9 last year that killed 19 health care workers, wounded 11 others and “damaged or destroyed medical facilities”
BEIRUT, Lebanon: Amnesty International said on Wednesday that Israel’s attacks on ambulances, paramedics and health facilities during its recent war with Hezbollah should be investigated as war crimes.
A November 27 truce agreement largely halted more than a year of hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel, including two months of all-out war during which Israel sent in ground troops.
During the conflict, the Israeli military accused the Iran-backed group of using ambulances belonging to the Hezbollah-affiliated Islamic Health Committee for transporting fighters and weapons, accusations the group denied.
According to Amnesty, “the Israeli military’s repeated unlawful attacks during the war in Lebanon on health facilities, ambulances and health workers, which are protected under international law, must be investigated as war crimes.”
It urged the Lebanese government to provide the International Criminal Court with “jurisdiction to investigate and prosecute crimes within the Rome Statute committed on Lebanese territory, and ensure victims’ right to remedy.”
In December, Lebanon’s then health minister Firass Abiad said that during the hostilities, there were “67 attacks on hospitals, including 40 hospitals that were directly targeted,” killing 16 people.
“There were 238 attacks on emergency response organizations, with 206 dead,” he said, adding that 256 emergency vehicles including fire trucks and ambulances were also “targeted.”
Amnesty said it investigated four Israeli attacks on health facilities and vehicles in Beirut and south Lebanon from October 3 to 9 last year that killed 19 health care workers, wounded 11 others and “damaged or destroyed multiple ambulances and two medical facilities.”
“Amnesty International did not find evidence that the facilities or vehicles were being used for military purposes at the time of the attacks,” the statement said.
The rights group said it wrote to the Israeli military in November with its findings but had not received a response by the time of publication.
“The Israeli military has not provided sufficient justifications, or specific evidence of military targets being present at the strike locations” to account for the “repeated attacks, which weakened a fragile health care system and put lives at risk,” Amnesty added.
According to Lebanese authorities, more than 4,000 people were killed in more than the year of hostilities.
Swathes of the south and east and parts of Beirut’s southern suburbs were heavily damaged in the Israeli bombardment, with reconstruction costs expected to top $10 billion, Lebanese authorities have said.
Israel security agency acknowledges failure in preventing October 7 attack
- The acknowledgement comes days after an Israeli military investigations noted similar failings to protect Israelis during the attack, which left hundreds dead and sparked a devastating war in the Gaza Strip
JERUSALEM: Israel’s domestic security agency Shin Bet acknowledged on Tuesday its failure in preventing Hamas’s attack on October 7, 2023, saying that if it had acted differently the deadliest day in Israel’s history could have been averted.
The Internal Security Agency, as it is formally known, said that an internal probe “reveals that if the Shin Bet had acted differently, both in the years leading up to the attack and on the night of the attack... the massacre could have been prevented.”
The acknowledgement comes days after an Israeli military investigations noted similar failings to protect Israelis during the attack, which left hundreds dead and sparked a devastating war in the Gaza Strip, where tens of thousands of Palestinians have been killed.
In the opening lines of the summary of findings from the Shin Bet investigation, the agency’s chief Ronen Bar takes responsiblity for failures, saying that “as the head of the organization, I will bear this heavy burden on my shoulders for the rest of my life.”
However, he added that in order to truly understand how the unprecedented attack was not stopped, there needed to be a broader probe into the role of Israel’s security and political elements and the cooperation between them.
According to the summary, the investigation focused on two key areas — the direct reasons that led to the Shin Bet failing to recognize the immediate threat from Hamas, and the developments preceding the attack.
It noted that “the investigation found no indication that the Shin Bet underestimated the enemy,” Palestinian militant group Hamas.
“On the contrary, there was a deep understanding of the threat, initiatives, and a desire to neutralize the threat, particularly targeting Hamas leadership,” the summary said.
The investigation found that prior knowledge of a Hamas attack plan was not treated as an “actionable threat” and there was an overarching assessment that Hamas was more focused on “inciting violence” in the occupied West Bank.
Additionally, the investigation found that “a policy of quiet had enabled Hamas to undergo massive military buildup,” with financial aid from Qatar going directly to Hamas’s military wing.
In conclusion, the agency said in its summary, “the Shin Bet failed to provide a warning regarding the scope of the attack and the large-scale raid by Hamas” that sparked months of war in Gaza.
“The warning issued on the night of October 7 was not translated into operational directives, and the response given by the Shin Bet... was insufficient to prevent or thwart the large scale attack.”
In the military inquiry, which includes 77 separate investigations into what transpired in communities, army bases and multiple confrontation points around the Gaza periphery, the army noted flaws in its intelligence assessments of Hamas, including the group’s military capabilities and overall intentions.
“We did not even imagine such a scenario,” said an army official who had briefed the media ahead of the probe’s release on Thursday.
The official said the army had not maintained “a comprehensive understanding of the enemy’s military capabilities” and that it was “overconfident in its knowledge.”
“We were addicted to precise intel,” a second senior military official said at the same briefing, explaining that despite signs Hamas was preparing to attack, the army was too focused on what it believed was accurate information.
Also following the publication of the findings of the army’s investigation, the outgoing chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi, said that he took full responsibility for failing to predict or stop the attack.
In addition to Halevi, the head of the military’s southern command, Major General Yaron Finkelman, and military intelligence chief Major General Aharon Haliva have both stepped down.
