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Hamas should be disarmed, excluded from ruling Gaza: French FM

Hamas should be disarmed, excluded from ruling Gaza: French FM

Al Arabiyaa day ago
France Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot on Saturday called on Hamas to be disarmed as videos of Israeli hostages held in Gaza were released.
'Despicable, unbearable images of the Israeli hostages held for 666 days in Gaza by Hamas,' Barrot wrote in a post on X
'They must be freed, without conditions,' he added. 'Hamas must be disarmed and excluded from ruling Gaza.'
He also called for humanitarian aid to be supplied to the people of Gaza in massive quantities.
Hamas released a minute-long video Friday of an Israeli hostage held in Gaza looking weak and malnourished, inside a narrow concrete tunnel.
On Thursday, the armed wing of the Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad published a video of an Israeli-German hostage abducted during Hamas's October 2023 attack on Israel.
The release of the videos has sparked outrage in Israel.
Israel's top general, army chief of staff Lieutenant General Eyal Zamir, warned Saturday there would be no respite in fighting in Gaza if negotiations fail to quickly secure the release of hostages.
Of the 251 hostages taken during the Hamas October 7, 2023 attack, 49 are still being held in Gaza, including 27 the Israeli military says are dead.
Hamas's 2023 attack resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to a tally based on official figures.
A total of 898 Israeli soldiers have also been killed since ground troops were sent into Gaza, according to the military.
Israel's campaign in Gaza has killed at least 60,332 people in Gaza, mostly civilians, according to figures from the territory's health ministry, deemed reliable by the UN.
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A father's grief and a nation's hope: Lebanon awaits justice 5 years after Beirut blast
A father's grief and a nation's hope: Lebanon awaits justice 5 years after Beirut blast

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time10 minutes ago

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A father's grief and a nation's hope: Lebanon awaits justice 5 years after Beirut blast

BSALIM: George Bezdjian remembers searching for his daughter, Jessica, after a massive explosion at Beirut's port five years ago. He found her at the St. Georges Hospital where she worked as a nurse. The hospital was in the path of the blast and was heavily damaged. He found his daughter lying on the floor as her colleagues tried to revive her. They weren't able to save her. She was one of four medical staff killed there. 'I started telling God that living for 60 years is more than enough. If you're going to take someone from the family, take me and leave her alive,' he told The Associated Press from his home in Bsalim, some 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) away from the port. He sat in a corner where he put up portraits of Jessica next to burning incense to honor her. 'I begged him, but he didn't reply to me.' The Aug. 4, 2020 blast in Beirut's port tore through the Lebanese capital after hundreds of tons of ammonium nitrate detonated in a warehouse. The gigantic explosion killed at least 218 people, according to an AP count, wounded more than 6,000 others and devastated large swathes of Beirut, causing billions of dollars in damages. It further angered the nation, already in economic free-fall after decades of corruption and financial crimes. Many family members of the victims pinned their hopes on Judge Tarek Bitar, who was tasked with investigating the explosion. The maverick judge shook the country's ruling elite, pursuing top officials, who for years obstructed his investigation. But five years after the blast, no official has been convicted as the probe stalled. And the widespread rage over the explosion and years of apparent negligence from a web of political, security and judicial officials has faded as Lebanon's economy further crumbled and conflict rocked the country. Judge Bitar had aimed to release the indictment last year but it was stalled by months of war between Israel and the Hezbollah militant group that decimated large swaths of southern and eastern Lebanon, killing some 4,000 people. In early 2025, Lebanon elected President Joseph Aoun, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam and a Cabinet that came to power on reformist platforms. They vowed that completing the port probe and holding the perpetrators to account would be a priority. 'There will be no settlement in the port case before there is accountability,' Salam said Sunday. Bitar, apparently galvanized by these developments, summoned a handful of senior political and security officials in July, as well as three judges in a new push for the case, but was unable to release an indictment over the summer as had been widely expected. 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Culture Minister Ghassan Salameh Sunday classified them as historical monuments. There was no centralized effort by the cash-strapped Lebanese government to rebuild the surrounding neighborhoods. An initiative by the World Bank, Europe and United Nations to fund recovery projects was slow to kick off, while larger reconstruction projects were contingent on reforms that never came. Many family and business owners fixed their damaged property out of pocket or reached out to charities and grassroots initiatives. A 2022 survey by the Beirut Urban Lab, a research center at the American University of Beirut, found that 60 percent to 80 percent of apartments and businesses damaged in the blast had been repaired. 'This was a reconstruction primarily driven by nonprofits and funded by diaspora streams,' said Mona Harb, a professor of urban studies and politics at AUB and co-founder of the research center. 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NGOs caught between juntas and militants in turbulent Sahel
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NGOs caught between juntas and militants in turbulent Sahel

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Far-right Israeli minister Itamar Ben-Gvir prays at al-Aqsa, violating decades-old agreement
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Visits to the site, the first Islamic Qibla – the direction Muslims across the world pray towards, by Israeli officials are considered a provocation across the Arab and Muslim world. Openly praying on the premises violates a longstanding status quo. Jews have been allowed to visit and tour the holy compound, but are barred from praying there, with Israeli troops and police meant to ensure that as they protect the premises. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office says Israel would not change the norms governing the site following Ben-Gvir's far-right minister visited the site following Hamas' release of videos showing an Israeli hostage in Gaza appearing thin and weak. The video sparked an uproar in Israel and piled pressure on Netanyahu's government to strike a deal to bring back the remaining 50 hostages are still under Hamas captivity in Gaza, 20 of which are still believed to be alive. They were taken after Hamas staged an attack on southern Israel on 7 October, 2023, killing 1,200 mission to the UN said it requested an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council on the hostages, which will take place Tuesday.'They do not want a deal,' Netanyahu said of Hamas. 'They want to break us using these videos of horror.'His office said it spoke with the Red Cross to seek help in providing the hostages with food and medical care. The International Committee of the Red Cross said it was 'appalled by the harrowing videos' and called for access to the military wing said it was ready to respond positively to Red Cross requests to deliver food to hostages, if humanitarian corridors are opened in a 'regular and permanent manner' in called for Israel to formally annex the Gaza Strip and renewed his desire to a Palestinian expulsion from the territory, with it reviving rhetoric that has complicated hostage deal and ceasefire said the video showing 24-year-old Evyatar David in a dimly lit tunnel is an attempt to pressure Israel and increase global criticism against it to strike a deal, which he opposed, instead endorsing further attacks on visit was condemned as an incitement by Palestinian leaders, as well as Jordan – custodians of the al-Aqsa Mosque, Saudi Arabia and Turkey. Houthi rebels in Yemen fired three drones at Israel shortly after, which Israel said were previous visits to the holy site caused an eruption in violence in and around the site, fuelling an 11-day war with Hamas in officials in Gaza say Israeli forces killed 33 Palestinians on Sunday enroute to aid distribution hubs. Eyewitnesses say Israeli soldiers opened fire as hungry crowds surged towards the aid Yousef Abed described coming under indiscriminate fire and seeing at least three people bleeding on the ground. 'I couldn't stop and help them because of the bullets,' he hospitals in southern and central Gaza said they received bodies from routes leading to the Israeli-backed US company, Gaza Humanitarian Foundation's (GHF) aid sites, including 11 killed in the Teina area while trying to reach the hub in Khan Palestinian eyewitnesses, including one traveling through Teina, said they saw soldiers open fire on the routes, which are in military military said it was not aware of casualties as a result of its gunfire near aid sites. GHF's media office said there was no gunfire 'near or at our sites.'The United Nations says 859 people were killed near GHF sites from 27 May to 31 July and hundreds of others have been killed along the routes of UN-led food says its armed contractors have only used pepper spray or fired warning shots to prevent deadly crowding. The IDF said it only fires warning shots. Both claim the death tolls have been Hamas-run Health Ministry says 93 children and 82 adults have died so far from malnutrition-related UN says 500-600 aid trucks are needed daily to satisfy the needs of Gaza's two million population, only a fraction of that enters the enclave in what it described as a man-made humanitarian deaths are not included in the ministry's war casualty ministry says the death toll from Israeli attacks across Gaza is now nearing 61,000. Their figures do not distinguish between civilian and combatant casualties, but the UN says deaths it has been able to verify indicate that more than two-thirds were women and children. — Euronews

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