Interior Minister sets South Lebanon and Nabatieh municipal elections for May 24 due to national holiday
The elections will be held on Saturday, May 24, 2025, instead of Sunday, as the original date coincides with the official holiday marking Resistance and Liberation Day.
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L'Orient-Le Jour
01-08-2025
- L'Orient-Le Jour
Barrack: Washington to observe Sharaa before removing Syria from list of terrorism-supporting states
U.S. envoy Tom Barrack said Thursday that Syria will remain on the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism until interim President Ahmad al-Sharaa takes concrete steps, local media reported. This statement comes a few weeks after U.S. President Donald Trump signed a decree formalizing the lifting of U.S. sanctions against Damascus. This measure, presented as a new step in the rapprochement between the two countries after the fall of Bashar al-Assad, was announced in Riyadh on May 13. The U.S. president had then declared his intention to "give a chance for greatness" to the new Syrian authorities. The next day, he spoke with Sharaa, the interim president from the rebel coalition led by the Islamist group Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which overthrew the regime last December. Since then, Washington has lifted or eased a large part of its economic sanctions to allow Syria's return to the international financial system and encourage foreign investments. Barrack said he "has confidence in Ahmad al-Sharaa's sincerity," considering that "his goals for Syria are consistent with those of the United States and its allies." He emphasized the importance of building a Syrian state that "includes all components of the country" to ensure stability and security. Regarding the investigation into the murder of an American citizen in Sweida, Barrack noted that the Syrian administration "is fully cooperating with the FBI." The incident dates back to July, when a collective execution carried out in downtown Sweida was filmed and then posted online by one of the perpetrators. The events took place in a context of intercommunal tensions pitting Sunni Bedouin tribes, supported by government forces, against Druze factions. A Syrian-American citizen was among the identified victims. On the subject of relations between Syria and Israel, the U.S. envoy stated that no agreement has yet been found on the nature of these relations, while admitting that Israeli intervention in Syria complicates the situation. In early July, however, Damascus declared itself willing to cooperate with Washington to return to the 1974 agreement with Israel. The Jewish state has been conducting airstrikes in Syria since December 2024 and has deployed troops in the demilitarized buffer zone of the Golan, in violation of that agreement, according to the UN. Damascus has not responded and acknowledged having conducted indirect talks with Israel aimed at reducing tensions.
Al Manar
01-08-2025
- Al Manar
Damascus Believed It Had Green Light from US, ‘Israel' to Deploy Forces to Sweida: Report
Syria's new authorities misread how Israel would respond to its troops deploying to the country's south this week, encouraged by US messaging that Syria should be governed as a centralized state, Reuters reported, citing eight sources familiar with the matter. Israel carried out strikes on Syrian troops and on Damascus on Wednesday in an escalation that took the leadership led by Ahmad Al-Saraa by surprise, the sources said, after government forces were accused of killing scores of people in the Druze city of Sweida. Damascus believed it had a green light from both the US and 'Israel' to dispatch its forces south 'despite months of Israeli warnings not to do so,' according to the sources, which include Syrian political and military officials, two diplomats, and regional security sources. That understanding was based on public and private comments from US special envoy for Syria Thomas Barrack, as well as on nascent security talks with 'Israel', the sources said, as quoted by Reuters. Barrack has called for Syria to be centrally administered as 'one country' without autonomous zones. A State Department spokesperson declined to comment on private diplomatic discussions but said the United States supported the territorial unity of Syria. 'The Syrian state has an obligation to protect all Syrians, including minority groups,' the spokesperson said, according to Reuters, urging the Syrian government to hold perpetrators of violence accountable. In response to Reuters questions, a senior official from Syria's ministry of foreign affairs denied that Barrack's comments had influenced the decision to deploy troops, which was made based on 'purely national considerations' and with the aim of 'stopping the bloodshed, protecting civilians and preventing the escalation of civil conflict'. Damascus sent troops and tanks to Sweida province on Monday to quell fighting between allied Bedouin tribes and armed factions within the Druze community. Syrian forces entering the city came under fire from Druze militia, according to Syrian sources. Subsequent violence attributed to Syrian troops, including field executions and the humiliation of Druze civilians, amid Israeli strikes on Syrian security forces, the defense ministry in Damascus and the environs of the presidential palace, according to two sources, including a senior Gulf Arab official. 🎥 WATCH: when even mainstream media, that cheered for the ousting of pesident Assad, like Sky News' Alex Crawford reporting from Sweida exposes Julani's gangs looting homes, shops, even farm animals. And this is what the West still dares to call a 'revolution'? These are no… — Marwa Osman || مروة عثمان (@Marwa__Osman) July 20, 2025
L'Orient-Le Jour
30-07-2025
- L'Orient-Le Jour
The Druze and Damascus: The history of a relationship on thin ice
Since July 13, the Sweida region has been suffering steadily. Never before has the division between Damascus and the Druze community, which has made this southern mountain its stronghold, been so a few days of fighting, initially between the Druze and local Bedouin tribes, the arrival of government forces in the province on July 14 turned the situation into a Syrian Network for Human Rights estimated on July 24 that at least 814 people had died in two weeks in Sweida, a province beyond the reach of the Syrian Army, which acting president Ahmad al-Sharaa has been trying to bring back into Damascus's fold since Bashar Assad's fall in December 2024. Current diplomatic situation Druze Sheikh Aql extends a hand to Hijri: Are Lebanese Druze working toward de-escalation in Sweida? Relatively concentrated...
