BEIRUT: Fears of an escalation in the simmering conflict between Hezbollah and Israel have prompted some airlines to cancel flights to Lebanon, but business appeared to be proceeding as usual Tuesday at the Beirut airport, where many travelers greeted the warnings with a shrug.
Hadi Sharqawi, 24, a Lebanese student in Italy, arrived Tuesday after two days of flight cancelations, to spend a month and a half with his family as he normally does in the summer. He is from the town of Kharayeb, which is in southern Lebanon although relatively far from the border where clashes have been ongoing for 10 months.
“As far as the threats, they didn’t influence me at all to not come to Lebanon,” Sharqawi said. “Even if there are threats, we will still come.”
Seventy-one-year-old Mohammad Mokhaled, from the southern town of Jarjouh, who was waiting to pick up his daughter Tuesday, agreed.
“We are not scared of the situation, because we are used to this,” he said. “We hear airstrikes regularly and the breaking of the sound barrier, and it doesn’t affect us.”
Lebanon is bracing for a retaliatory strike from Israel after a missile hit a soccer field in the town of Majdal Shams in the Israeli-annexed Syrian Golan over the weekend, killing 12 children and adolescents. Israel accused the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah of carrying out the strike, to which Hezbollah issued a rare denial.
Even before the deadly incident, rhetoric and fears of a full-blown conflict had been intensifying, but it has had relatively little impact on the summer tourist season, during which tens of thousands of Lebanese working or studying abroad typically come to visit their families, filling up restaurants and beach clubs.
Israel and the Lebanese militant group have traded near-daily strikes since the war in Gaza erupted on Oct.7 following Hamas’ surprise attack on southern Israel.
The Beirut airport reported that 406,396 passengers arrived in June compared to 427,854 arrivals in the same period in 2023, a decrease of 5 percent. It also recorded 300,362 departed the country in June, compared to 280,366, an increase of 7 percent.
Amal Ahmadieh, 23, was leaving Tuesday to return to Qatar, where she works in a restaurant, after a vacation in Lebanon. Ahmadieh said she was leaving as originally scheduled and had not pushed up her flight due to security concerns.
“Honestly everyone was telling me that the situation was not good but I wanted to come to see my friends and my family,” she said. “Whatever happens, at the end of the day, this is my country.”
Some European airlines have canceled flights in light of the increased tensions. Frankfurt-based Lufthansa Group said Monday that three of its airlines — Lufthansa, Swiss and Eurowings — decided to suspend flights to and from Beirut “up to and including” August 5. Air France also suspended some of its flights, while other airlines changed their flight schedules.
Lebanon’s Middle East Airlines delayed some flights to arrive Tuesday morning instead of at night, the carrier said, “due to technical reasons related to the distribution of insurance risks.”
MEA chief Mohamad El-Hout, however, downplayed fears. Following a meeting Tuesday with caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, the state-run National News Agency said Hout had “denied that Rafik Hariri Airport had received any threats or information from any source that the airport would be attacked.”
He pointed out that Lufthansa Group had also canceled flights to Lebanon in the early months of the war in Gaza and border conflict in Lebanon, “and nothing happened then.”
What happened in Majdal Shams has kicked off a flurry of diplomatic efforts to prevent the situation from spiraling.
A Western diplomat whose country is involved in those efforts said that he anticipates Israel will keep its retaliation within boundaries that would not lead to an all-out war — similar to the exchange of strikes between Iran and Israel after Israel struck an Iranian consular building in Syria. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.
“It’s clear that they (Israel) want to take a stance but without leading to a generalized conflict,” he said. “It’s sure that there will be a retaliation. It will be symbolic. It may be spectacular, but it will not be a reason for both parties to engage in a general escalation.”
Despite escalating tension between Israel and Hezbollah, it’s business as usual at Beirut airport
https://arab.news/p2tt8
Despite escalating tension between Israel and Hezbollah, it’s business as usual at Beirut airport
- “As far as the threats, they didn’t influence me at all to not come to Lebanon,” Sharqawi said. “Even if there are threats, we will still come”
- Even before the deadly incident, rhetoric and fears of a full-blown conflict had been intensifying, but it has had relatively little impact on the summer tourist season
US says it is aware of Palestinian American’s killing by Israeli forces in West Bank
- Israel has expanded and consolidated settlements in the occupied West Bank as part of the steady integration of these territories into the state of Israel in breach of international law, the UN human rights office said last month
WASHINGTON: The US State Department said on Tuesday it was aware of the killing by Israeli forces of a Palestinian American teenager in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and was seeking more information about the incident.
A State Department spokesperson made the comments to reporters when asked about the killing of US citizen Omar Mohammad Rabea, 14, and the shooting of two other teenagers.
“We are certainly aware of that dynamic,” the State Department spokesperson said. “There is an investigation that is going on. We are aware of the reports from the IDF that this was a counterterrorism act, we need to learn more about the nature of what happened on the ground.”
The Palestinian foreign ministry condemned the weekend incident as an “extra-judicial killing” by Israeli forces during a raid. A local mayor said Rabea was shot along with two other teenagers by an Israeli settler and that the Israeli army pronounced him dead after detaining him.
The Israeli military said it shot a “terrorist” who endangered civilians by hurling rocks.
“We don’t have the complete picture of what was going on on the ground,” the State Department spokesperson added.
Israel has expanded and consolidated settlements in the occupied West Bank as part of the steady integration of these territories into the state of Israel in breach of international law, the UN human rights office said last month.
Settler violence in the West Bank, including incursions into occupied territory and raids, has intensified since the start of Israel’s war in Gaza that has killed over 50,000, according to Gaza’s health ministry, and led to genocide and war crimes accusations that Israel denies.
The Israeli onslaught in Gaza followed a Hamas attack in October 2023 in which 1,200 were killed and about 250 taken hostage, according to Israeli tallies.
Israel troops shoot dead woman in alleged West Bank knife attack
- Yaqub was a lawyer and mother of three from nearby Biddya, the village’s mayor, Ahmed Abu Safiyeh, told AFP
- The Israeli military said Tuesday that Israeli settlers set fire to a Palestinian event hall overnight in the area of Biddya, and that no injuries were reported
HARES, Palestinian Territories: The Palestinian health ministry said Israeli troops killed a 30-year-old woman near the West Bank city of Salfit on Tuesday after what the army described as an attempted stabbing.
The ministry reported the death of Amana Ibrahim Mohammed Yaqub, 30, “who was shot by (Israeli) forces near Salfit,” south of Nablus.
The Israeli military said it had “neutralized a terrorist who hurled rocks and attempted to stab soldiers adjacent to the Gitai Avisar junction” close to the West Bank village of Hares.
An AFP journalist reported seeing a lifeless body under a foil blanket by the roadside at the scene of the attack.
Yaqub was a lawyer and mother of three from nearby Biddya, the village’s mayor, Ahmed Abu Safiyeh, told AFP.
The Israeli military said Tuesday that Israeli settlers set fire to a Palestinian event hall overnight in the area of Biddya, and that no injuries were reported.
An AFP journalist reported most of the hall was burned to the ground, and that settlers left graffiti in Hebrew on nearby walls.
The area around Salfit and Biddya is dense with Israeli settlements, including the town of Ariel.
Since the start of the Gaza war in October 2023, violence has soared in the occupied West Bank. Israeli troops and settlers have killed at least 918 Palestinians in the territory, according to health ministry figures.
Palestinian attacks and clashes during military raids have killed at least 33 Israelis, including soldiers, over the same period, according to Israeli figures.
Hamas official says ‘necessary to reach a ceasefire’ in Gaza
- “This war cannot continue indefinitely, and it is therefore necessary to reach a ceasefire,” Hossam Badran, a member of Hamas’s political bureau, told AFP
GAZA CITY, Palestinian Territories: A Hamas official told AFP on Tuesday that it was “necessary to reach a ceasefire” in the Gaza Strip, three weeks after Israel resumed bombardments on the Palestinian territory.
“This war cannot continue indefinitely, and it is therefore necessary to reach a ceasefire,” Hossam Badran, a member of Hamas’s political bureau, told AFP, adding that “communication with the mediators is still ongoing” but that “so far, there are no new proposals.”
Iran-backed militias in Iraq ‘ready to disarm’
- They fear threat of US airstrikes
BAGHDAD: Powerful Iran-backed militias in Iraq are ready to disarm to avert the threat of US airstrikes, they said on Tuesday.
The move follows repeated private warnings by US officials to the Iraqi government since Donald Trump took office as US president in January.
They told Baghdad that unless it acted to disband the militias on its soil, America could attack the groups.
“Trump is ready to take the war with us to worse levels, we know that, and we want to avoid such a bad scenario,” said one commander of Kata’ib Hezbollah, the most powerful militia.
BACKGROUND
Militia leaders said the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps had told them to do whatever they deemed necessary to avoid being drawn into a potentially ruinous conflict with the US.
The others that have offered to lay down their weapons are Nujabaa, Kata’ib Sayyed Al-Shuhada and Ansarullah Al-Awfiyaa.
Militia leaders said their main ally and patron, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in Iran, had told them to do whatever they deemed necessary to avoid being drawn into a potentially ruinous conflict with the US.
The militias are part of the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, about 10 armed factions with about 50,000 fighters and arsenals that include long-range missiles and anti-aircraft weapons.
They are a key pillar of Iran’s network of regional proxy forces, and have carried out dozens of missile and drone attacks on Israel and US forces in Iraq and Syria since the Gaza war began in 2023.
Iraqi security officials said Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ Al-Sudani was pressing for disarmament by all militias that declared their allegiance to the Revolutionary Guards or its Quds Force rather than to Baghdad.
Some have already quit their bases and reduced their presence in major cities including Mosul and Anbar for fear of airstrikes.
Pro-Turkiye Syria groups reduce presence in Kurdish area
- Turkish forces and their Syrian proxies carried out an offensive from January to March 2018 targeting Kurdish fighters in the Afrin area
- Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) played a key role in the recapture of the last territory held by the Daesh group in Syria in 2019
DAMASCUS: Pro-Turkiye Syrian groups have scaled down their military presence in a historically Kurdish-majority area of the country’s north which they have controlled since 2018, a Syrian defense ministry official said on Tuesday.
The move follows an agreement signed last month between Syria’s new authorities and Kurdish officials that provides for the return of displaced Kurds, including tens of thousands who fled the Afrin region in 2018.
The pro-Ankara groups have “reduced their military presence and checkpoints” in Afrin, in Aleppo province, the official told AFP, requesting anonymity as they were not authorized to speak to the media.
Their presence has been “maintained in the region for now,” said the official, adding that authorities wanted to station them in army posts but these had been a regular target of Israeli strikes.
After Islamist-led forces ousted longtime ruler Bashar Assad in December, the new authorities announced the disbanding of all armed groups and their integration into the new army, a move that should include pro-Turkiye groups who control swathes of northern Syria.
Turkish forces and their Syrian proxies carried out an offensive from January to March 2018 targeting Kurdish fighters in the Afrin area.
The United Nations has estimated that half of the enclave’s 320,000 inhabitants fled during the offensive.
The Kurds and rights groups have accused the pro-Turkiye forces of human rights violations in the area.
Last month, the Kurdish semi-autonomous administration that controls swathes of northern and northeastern Syria struck a deal to integrate its civil and military institutions into those of the central government.
The administration’s de facto army, the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), played a key role in the recapture of the last territory held by the Daesh group in Syria in 2019, with backing from a US-led international coalition.
A Kurdish source close to the matter said the people of Afrin were “waiting for all the checkpoints to be removed and for the exit of pro-Turkiye factions.”
Requesting anonymity as the issue is sensitive, the source told AFP that in talks with Damascus, the SDF was pushing for security personnel deployed in Afrin to be from the area.
The SDF is also calling for “international organizations or friendly countries from the international coalition” to supervise collective returns, the source added.
Syria’s new leadership has been seeking to unify the country since the December overthrow of longtime president Bashar Assad after more than 13 years of civil war.
This month, Kurdish fighters withdrew from two neighborhoods of Aleppo as part of the deal.
Syrian Kurdish official Bedran Kurd said on X that the Aleppo city agreement “represents the first phase of a broader plan aimed at ensuring the safe return of the people of Afrin.”
