Hezbollah evacuates some positions in Lebanon, Syria: Report
Hezbollah and its affiliated groups have evacuated some positions in parts of Lebanon and Syria after Israel promised to exact a “heavy price” over the deadly rocket attack on the occupied Golan Heights, according to AFP.
A source close to the Lebanese armed group told AFP that “Hezbollah has evacuated some positions in the south and in the Bekaa Valley [in the east] that it thinks could be a target for Israel”.
In Syria, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based war monitor, said pro-Iran groups and Hezbollah-affiliated fighters have “evacuated their positions” south of the capital, Damascus, and in the surrounding countryside, as well as in parts of the Syrian-controlled Golan Heights, in anticipation of “potential Israeli airstrikes”.
Photos of the children and teens killed in a rocket strike at a football field, are displayed at a roundabout as people light candles in their memories, at the village of Majdal Shams, in the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights, July 28
Israeli military says it shot down drone fired from Lebanon
The Israeli military says it intercepted a drone over the western Galilee which had been fired from Lebanon.
Sirens heard in the area were sounded to warn people about potential fragments of the destroyed missile falling and there were no casualties, the military added in a post on X.
At least 1 killed after Israeli drone targets car, motorcycle in Lebanon
An Israeli drone has targeted a car and a motorcycle on the Qalaa road between the towns of Meiss el-Jabal and Chaqra in southern Lebanon, according to Lebanon’s National News Agency (NNA) and Lebanon 24.
The attack on the car injured two people and the one on the motorcycle killed one and injured two others, including a child, the NNA reported. The victims are being transferred to Tebnin Governmental Hospital in the nearby town of Tebnin, it added.
The Lebanon 24 broadcaster gave a higher death toll, saying one person was killed in each of the attacks.
Hezbollah mourns 2 members killed in southern Lebanon
The Lebanese group says two of its members – Abbas Muhammad Salami and Abbas Fadi Hijazi – have been killed.
Salami, also known as Zain al-Abidin, was a 33-year-old from the town of Khirbet Silm, who lived in the town of Chaqra in southern Lebanon. Hijazi, also known as Abbas al-Hurr, was a 29-year-old from the town of Majdal Selem, also in southern Lebanon.
Hezbollah claims attack on Israeli military site
The Lebanese group says it has attacked the “al-Baghdadi site” in northern Israel “with dozens of Katyusha rockets”. The group said on Telegram the targeting was carried out in support of Gaza and in response to “the aggression and assassination” in the town of Chaqra.
Hezbollah announces strike on Israeli army site
The Lebanese group says it has attacked the “al-Raheb site” in northern Israel with guided missiles. Less than an hour ago, Hezbollah had said it conducted a separate rocket attack on the “al-Baghdadi site” in northern Israel.
Lufthansa suspends flights to Beirut
The German airline group said it is suspending flights to the Lebanese capital up to and including July 30 because of the current situation in the Middle East.
It said flights by the group’s carriers, Swiss International Air Lines, Eurowings and Lufthansa have been suspended “in an abundance of caution”.
More Beirut flights cancelled, delayed
Earlier, we reported that Lebanon’s Middle East Airlines has announced delays to some of its flights. Reuters, citing Beirut airport’s flight information board, is now reporting that Turkish Airlines also cancelled two flights overnight on Sunday.
The agency also cited Flightradar24 as saying that Turkey-based budget carrier SunExpress, Turkish Airlines subsidiary AJet, Greek carrier Aegean Airlines, Ethiopian Air and MEA have also cancelled flights scheduled to land in Beirut on Monday.
The airlines have not commented publicly on the reasons for the cancellations.
Beirut-Rafic Hariri International Airport is Lebanon’s only airport. It has been targeted in the country’s civil war, and previous fighting with Israel, including in the last war between Hezbollah and Israel in 2006.
Efforts under way to contain awaited Israeli response: Lebanon’s top diplomat
Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib says a flurry of diplomatic activity is under way to contain an expected Israeli response against Hezbollah.
The United States, France and others were trying to prevent a regional conflict, he said in an interview yesterday night with local broadcaster al-Jadeed.
“Israel will escalate in a limited way and Hezbollah will respond in a limited way … These are the assurances we’ve received,” Bou Habib said.
Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati said in a statement yesterday that “talks are ongoing with international, European and Arab sides to protect Lebanon and ward off dangers”.
Italian foreign minister discusses need to avoid ‘new war’ with Israeli, Lebanese counterparts
Antonio Tajani says he has spoken to his counterparts – Israel’s Israel Katz and Lebanon’s Abdallah Bou Habib – seeking “to avoid a new war” in the Middle East.
“Breaking the spiral of violence is possible,” the foreign minister said on X, adding that the Italian government was committed to peace and stability in the region, including through Italy’s presence in the UNIFIL contingent.
“[The UN] 1701 is crucial,” he added, referring to the UN resolution adopted in 2006 to bring an end to the war between Israel and Hezbollah fighters in Lebanon.
That’s when UN peacekeepers were deployed to monitor a ceasefire along the 120km (75-mile) demarcation line, or Blue Line, between Israel and Lebanon.
Netanyahu visits rocket attack site in occupied Golan Heights
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has visited the site of a deadly rocket attack in the town of Majdal Shams in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.
Reporting about the visit, he said on X that Israel’s “response will come, and it will be hard”, reiterating that Lebanon’s Hezbollah was behind the attack that killed 12 youth despite the armed group’s denial of any involvement.
He told the Druze community of the region not to lose hope “in the face of the acts of harassment by the evil axis of Iran and Hezbollah”.
Earlier, there were reports of hundreds of Majdal Shams residents objecting to Netanyahu’s visit, trying to prevent him from entering the town and calling him a fascist and a criminal.
The news outlet Israel Hayom broadcast a video, verified by Al Jazeera’s Sanad fact-checking agency, in which residents of the town were heard making angry chants against Netanyahu and demanding that he leave.
Currently Online מהומות בזמן ביקור רה"מ נתניהו במג'דל שמס: "החוצה, איפה הביטחון?" pic.twitter.com/3kEKCMkNy6
— ישראל היום (@IsraelHayomHeb) July 29, 2024
Translation: Riots during Prime Minister Netanyahu’s visit to Majdal Shams: “Outside, where is the security?”
Hezbollah begins moving missiles amid Israel threat: Report
An official with the Lebanese group has told AP that Hezbollah’s stance has not changed and that it does not want a full-blown war with Israel.
The official added, however, that if a war breaks out, it will fight without limits.
The official, who spoke to the news agency on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military activities, said Hezbollah, since Sunday, has started moving some of its “smart precision-guided missiles” to use if needed.
Hezbollah’s move comes as Israel threatens to launch a “harsh” attack on Lebanon following the weekend strike that killed 12 children in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.
Cyprus on standby to help if civilian evacuations needed
Foreign Minister Constantinos Kombos says Cyprus is on standby to assist in the evacuation of civilians from the Middle East if the standoff between Israel and Hezbollah escalates.
Speaking to reporters, he said Cypriot authorities have had an emergency response mechanism in place for a possible evacuation of civilians since the start of the war.
“We have established the manner in which the scheme will operate, if needed,” Kombos said.
“We are all hoping it won’t be necessary, but should that not happen, Cyprus will continue to operate as a safety bridge in facilitating the departure of civilians from any embattled zone in our area,” he added.
Outrage after Harris, Australia’s Wong refer to Majdal Shams as ‘Israeli’ town
Legal experts have criticised statements from US Vice President Kamala Harris and Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong that described Majdal Shams in the Golan Heights as an Israeli town, although it is located in a territory that is internationally recognised as part of Syria.
Israel occupied two-thirds of the strategic Golan Heights plateau after capturing it in the Six-Day War in 1967, and annexed the territory in 1981.
Adil Haque, a law professor at Rutgers University, said Harris’s condemnation of the attack on the Golan Heights was “entirely appropriate” but “recognition of Israel’s illegal annexation of the Golan Heights is not”.
Majdal Shams is not an “Israeli” town. It is a Syrian town in the occupied Syrian Golan. @SenatorWong Delete your tweet and start again. Or is Australia into recognising annexed illegally occupied territory now? Would that apply to Crimea and eastern Ukraine? https://t.co/a9eTFVwEJI
— Rawan Arraf (@rawanarraf) July 28, 2024
Kamala Harris shifts tone on Gaza, but advocates say US voters want more
The US vice president and the Democratic Party’s likely presidential nominee has said that she will “not be silent” in the face of Palestinian suffering, but rights advocates want to know exactly what that means for Washington’s foreign policy.
They say expressing sympathy for Palestinians without pursuing a meaningful shift away from the US’s policy of unconditional military and diplomatic support will not help Harris win back voters alienated by President Joe Biden’s approach to the war.
“Without an actual commitment to stop killing the children of Gaza, I don’t care about her empathy for them,” said Eman Abdelhadi, a sociologist at the University of Chicago. She stressed that the US bears “responsibility” for the atrocities committed against Palestinians.
“To be empathetic to someone that you’re shooting in the head is not exactly laudable. We don’t need empathy from these people. We need them to stop providing the weapons and the money that is actively killing the people that they’re supposedly empathising with.”
Turkey compares Netanyahu to Hitler as tensions rise
More on the war of words between Israel and Turkey.
The Turkish Foreign Ministry issued a statement saying “just as the end of the genocidal Hitler came, so too will be the end of the genocidal Netanyahu,” according to the official Anadolu Agency.
“Just as the genocidal Nazis were held accountable, those who seek to destroy the Palestinians will also be held accountable,” the statement continued. “Humanity will stand with the Palestinians. You will not be able to destroy the Palestinians,” it added.
The statement came after Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz responded to remarks by the Turkish president in which he suggested Turkey should enter Israel to help the Palestinians. Katz said, “Erdogan was following in the footsteps of Saddam Hussein […] Just let him remember what happened there and how it ended.”
I would compare Netanyahu to Saddam Hussein and his prosecution of the Kurds "The al-Anfal military campaign against Kurdistan in Northern Iraq between 1986 and 1989 is qualified by some European countries as genocide. 182 000 Kurds were estimated to have been deported, killed, disappeared in depopulation campaigns in Kurdish areas carried out by Baath party."
Of course that's a sore point for Turkey as they have been oppressing the Kurds as well with a long dark history of atrocities.
https://dckurd.org/2023/03/23/dark-year-for-kurds-in-turkey/
https://www.cfr.org/timeline/kurds-long-struggle-statelessness
https://kurdistantribune.com/the-massacres-and-oppression-of-the-kurds-in-20th-century-turkey/
I guess it takes one to know one... Another struggle that's been ongoing for over a century.
Erdogan is ‘voice of humanity’s conscience’, says Turkish foreign minister
Hakan Fidan has taken to X to defend Erdogan as a war of words with Israel escalates.
“Our President has become the voice of humanity’s conscience,” Fidan wrote. “Those who seek to silence this just voice, especially international Zionist circles including Israel, are in a state of great panic. History has ended the same way for all genocidal perpetrators and their supporters.”
The statement came after Fidan’s Israeli counterpart attacked Erdogan on X after the Turkish president said his country could intervene in Israel’s war on Gaza.
The Kurdish autonomous region in northern Iraq is the first constitutionally recognised autonomous region of the Kurds, a de facto state that is secular and strives for liberal democracy. Internally it has a pluralistic structure. In spite of problems of good governance, the autonomous region has become a source of inspiration for Kurds in other states and has a continuing symbolic and political influence on the historically rooted aspiration for autonomy of the Kurds as a whole. It has become an important strategic actor and stability factor in the region, but also a reliable security partner for the West, especially in the fight against the “Islamic state”.
Israeli forces arrest 7 Palestinians in Bethlehem raid
Israeli forces have arrested seven Palestinians south of Bethlehem, Wafa reported.
A young Palestinian man was arrested during Israeli soldiers’ raid on his home in Tulkarem, the agency said.
We reported earlier that several people had been arrested in overnight Israeli raids across the occupied West Bank.
Israeli forces demolish Palestinian home near Jericho in West Bank
Local Palestinian channels on Telegram have published videos and photos showing Israeli bulldozers demolishing a Palestinian house in the village of Ein ad-Duyuk at-Tahta near Jericho in the occupied West Bank during their raid this morning.
Israeli settlers attack Palestinian property near Hebron, occupied West Bank
Local Palestinian channels have shared videos showing Palestinian cars burning in the village of Qalqas, south of Hebron in the occupied West Bank.
The videos verified by Sanad, Al Jazeera’s fact-checking agency, also showed cars that had racist graffiti sprayed on them.
According to local sources, Israelis from illegal settlements vandalised and set fire to residents’ properties.
Israeli forces arrest at least 15 in overnight West Bank raids
Among the Palestinians arrested were former prisoners, according to the Commission of Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs and the Palestinian Prisoner’s Society.
Separately, Israeli troops questioned more than 30 Palestinians in the Dheisheh refugee camp in Bethlehem, the organisation said, adding that most of them were let go.
Residential areas of Khan Younis, nearby al-Qarara bombed by Israeli forces
Israeli artillery has bombed the Sheikh Nasser neighbourhood in the centre of the southern city of Khan Younis in Gaza, according to Palestinian media.
Our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic also reported that Israeli forces blew up residential buildings in the town of al-Qarara, north of Khan Younis.
Palestinian media reported that Israeli artillery shelling hit the towns of Khuza’a and Abasan al-Kabira, east of Khan Younis.
Israeli air force claims hitting 35 targets in 24 hours in Gaza
The Israeli air force says it hit about 35 targets in Gaza in the past 24 hours, killing many people in Rafah and Khan Younis.
We have been reporting on recent Israeli attacks in Khan Younis, including an attack that targeted a tent in al-Mawasi and residential buildings in the Khan Younis governorate.
Israeli artillery shelling kills one in Khan Younis
A Palestinian has been killed and many others injured in Israeli artillery shelling that targeted the Abu Hamid roundabout in the southern city of Khan Younis in the Gaza Strip.
That’s according to our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic.
Earlier, we reported that Israeli forces were bombing residential areas of Khan Younis, as well as the nearby town of al-Qarara.
Number of people killed in Israeli attacks on Gaza increases
At least 39,363 people have been killed and 90,923 others wounded in Israel’s war on Gaza since October 7, according to the Health Ministry of the besieged and bombarded territory.
At least 39 Palestinians were killed in the past day alone, with 93 injured, it statement said.
Relatives mourn Palestinians killed by an Israeli attack in Gaza City
More on Israeli destruction of Rafah’s main water tank
We have reported earlier that a preliminary investigation is under way in Israel into the video posted by an Israeli soldier, showing the troops blowing up Rafah’s main drinking water tank last week.
Since then, Rafah Mayor Ahmed al-Sufi has commented about the attack which constituted “a crime against humanity”, saying the Israeli troops destroyed not only the tank but also a water well in the Tal as-Sultan neighbourhood, west of Rafah. The destruction exacerbated the water crisis in the southern city, he added.
“The documented scenes of the occupation soldiers blowing up the Canada water tank, which was feeding the Rafah water network with 3,000 m3 per day, and the Canada Well, which operates at an operational capacity of 180 m3/hour, and the soldiers’ boasting while carrying out their mission reveal the truth of their goals of destroying everything that exists and destroying the necessities of life and their disregard for international laws,” he said in a statement.
He added that the total cost of constructing the tank and well amounted to $1.7m.
Al-Sufi appealed to international community “to quickly intervene to stop the occupation’s crimes against the Palestinian people” and open the border crossings to bring in spare parts and machinery to repair the water network and the sewage network.
‘Serious abuse’ of Palestinian detainee reported at Israel’s Sde Teiman prison
Israeli soldiers are suspected of abusing a Palestinian detainee from Gaza at the Sde Teiman detention facility in southern Israel, according to Israeli media and officials. The incident prompted Major General Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi, Israel’s military advocate general, to open a military police investigation, according to the Times of Israel.
When the investigators arrived at the facility to take suspected abusers for questioning, a heated argument erupted, the report said.
Reaction to Israeli soldiers’ arrest over suspected abuse of Palestinian detainee
Nine Israeli soldiers suspected of abusing a Palestinian detainee at the Sde Teiman prison have been arrested, promptinh a strong reaction by the country’s far-fight politicians.
Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich published a video message on X, telling Military Advocate General Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi, who ordered the probe into the abuse, to take his hands off Israel’s “heroic warriors”.
National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and other members of his far-right Otzma Yehudit party announced that they were on their way to Sde Teiman to demand the release of the arrested soldiers.
Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee chairman Yuli Edelstein announces that he will hold an urgent hearing tomorrow to discuss the arrests, saying: “Our soldiers are not criminals and this contemptible pursuit of our soldiers is unacceptable to me.”
Meanwhile, Yair Golan, chairman of the Israeli Labor Party and former deputy chief of staff, said “it is the duty of the army and the state to investigate the commission of criminal offenses by soldiers who acted in violation of orders”.
“The army must not allow the phenomena of criminal battalions to do whatever they want inside it,” he said.
Israel using Golan Heights attack ‘for PR’
Marwan Bishara, Al Jazeera’s senior political analyst, says Israel’s public relations machine has been exploiting the current regional tensions and the weekend attack that took place in the occupied Golan Heights.
He highlighted how Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu flew back to Israel three hours early after his US trip following the deadly attack.
“They [the Israeli government] called it Netanyahu’s urgent return to Israel, because Israeli citizens were killed in a Hezbollah strike’,” he said, stressing that it was not clear if Hezbollah was behind the incident.
“To call Syrians living in the occupied Golan Heights ‘Israeli citizens’, is a stretch by every possible way,” the analyst added.
Don't forget the immediate rally to get the world behind attacking Lebanon.
Hamas says Netanyahu keeps stalling truce deal
The Palestinian group says Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has added new conditions and demands to a US ceasefire proposal, following the latest round of talks in Rome conducted through mediators.
The group said in a statement that the Israeli ceasefire response to the proposal showed that Netanyahu was stalling to avoid reaching an agreement.
“It is clear from what the mediators conveyed that Netanyahu has returned to his strategy of procrastination, evasion, and avoiding reaching an agreement by setting new conditions and demands,” Hamas added.
It accused Netanyahu of retreating from a proposal previously presented by the mediators, which it said had already been based on an “Israeli paper”.
Gaza is a ‘polio epidemic area’, Health Ministry says
Gaza’s Health Ministry has blamed Israel’s military offensive as it has declared a polio epidemic in the besieged and bombarded enclave.
In a statement on Telegram, it stressed the situation “poses a health threat to the residents of Gaza and neighbouring countries” and called it a “setback” to the global polio eradication programme.
The ministry called for an “immediate intervention to end the aggression and find radical solutions” to the issues of lack of potable water and personal hygiene, damaged sewage networks and removal of tonnes of rubbish and solid waste.
On Friday, the World Health Organization said it was sending more than one million polio vaccines to Gaza to be administered over the coming weeks to prevent children from being infected after the virus was detected in sewage samples.
Poliomyelitis, which is spread mainly through the fecal-oral route, is a highly infectious virus that can invade the nervous system and cause paralysis. Cases of polio have declined by 99 percent worldwide since 1988 thanks to mass vaccination campaigns and efforts continue to eradicate it everywhere.
Israel’s military, meanwhile, said it would start offering the polio vaccine to soldiers in Gaza.
The UN reported last week that besides detecting the polio virus, there has been a widespread increase in cases of hepatitis A, dysentery and gastroenteritis as sanitary conditions deteriorate in Gaza. Israel’s war has damaged and destroyed sewage and water systems, and sewage has spilled into the streets near some camps for displaced people.
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