Spotlight
Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri has warned against Israel's attempts to drag Lebanon into a broader war.
In remarks published Monday in al-Joumhouria newspaper, Berri said that israel has expanded the scope of its attacks against Lebanon and is now hitting areas relatively far from the border, deliberately targeting civilians, threatening and promoting proposals that are rejected by Lebanon, such as pushing for Hezbollah to withdraw north of the Litani River, which lies about 30 kilometers north of the border.
Full StoryHezbollah attacked overnight through Monday two Israeli forces near the Zar'it post and the Abu Djaj heights and another group of soldiers at the Raheb post as Israel hit several areas of southern Lebanon.
Israeli warplanes struck a two-story house in Shihine and the southern towns of Tayr Harfa, Merwahin and al-Taybeh.
Full StoryMaronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi on Sunday urged Speaker Nabih Berri to call for successive electoral session to elect a new president “without waiting for any sign from abroad.”
“The election of a president is MPs’ first duty … while continuing to refrain from doing this duty is a blatant treason against the people’s confidence,” al-Rahi warned in his Sunday Mass sermon.
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Two Hezbollah members were killed Saturday in an Israeli drone strike on their car in the southern town of al-Bazouriyeh near Tyre, some 20 kilometers from the nearest point of the border with Israel.
Full StoryAn Israeli airstrike Saturday on Damascus' Mazzeh neighborhood killed four Iranian Revolutionary Guard officers, including the head of the Quds Force's intelligence unit in Syria, media reports said.
The strike also killed Hezbollah official "Hajj Youness," who was in charge of transferring weapons from Iran by land, the reports said, noting that the targeted meeting was discussing transfering arms by land rather than by air.
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Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on Friday said that Israel is “committed to returning the residents of the north to their homes,” after tens of thousands were evacuated amid daily clashes with Hezbollah.
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Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea on Friday charged that “instead of performing its duties to achieve the interests of Lebanon and its people,” the caretaker government has “ceded the decision to a party and allowed it to turn the country into a battlefield,” apparently referring to Hezbollah and its clashes with Israel.
Full StoryHead of Hezbollah's bloc in parliament Mohammed Raad said Friday that Israel "is not ready" for a war with Lebanon as Hezbollah would fight "with all its might."
Since the start of the Gaza war, Israel and Hezbollah have traded cross-border strikes with gradually escalating intensity, even though neither side is believed to seek an all-out war which is bound to devastate both countries.
Full StoryCaretaker Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib has warned Israel that a war on Lebanon would not be “easy” for it and that “rockets will fall on it from all sides.”
“The Houthis are playing an international role and what they are doing is related to Gaza. Our stance is in harmony with the Arab stance and we don’t want an expansion of the war,” Bou Habib said in a TV interview.
Full StoryIsraeli drones carried out airstrikes Thursday morning on a house in Kawkaba, a village in the Hasbaya District as artillery shelled the southern border towns of Aitaroun, Blida, Mays el-Jabal and the Marjaayoun valley.
Later in the day, Israeli warplanes struck the outskirts of Rab Tlatine, al-Taybe, and al-Odaisseh.
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