Category Archives: Lebanon

Middle East crisis: Lammy to visit Bahrain and Jordan – as it happened

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This blog has now closed. You can see all our coverage of the Israel-Gaza war here, and our latest report on Israel’s attacks on Lebanon here.

Turkey will evacuate its citizens who have applied to leave Lebanon by sea on Wednesday, the Turkish foreign ministry said on Tuesday.

Reuters reports it said in a statement that two Turkish navy ships were expected to set off for Beirut on Tuesday with a total capacity of about 2,000 passengers, adding that the evacuation process will continue in the following days if necessary.

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Australia politics live: Dutton attacks Albanese for including calls for ceasefire and de-escalation in motion reflecting on 7 October

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So what’s that ARC research project on islands actually about, anyway?

A blog watcher has taken the trouble to look up the research project that has Liberal MP James Stevens all hot and bothered, Archipelagic Connections in Australian and Pacific Literature:

Australia is often defined as an isolated island-continent, ‘girt by sea’. This project aims to challenge this protectionist myth by analysing literary and historical connections between different geographical sites that have been represented as enclosed in Australian history.

It expects to offer new interpretations of interconnected narratives of Aboriginal Australian, South Sea Islander and migrant enclosure in Australian literature.

The project also contributes to national strategic initiatives into the ‘truth telling’ on Australia’s past relations to Aboriginal Australians and the study of environmental change in islands and archipelagos.

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Starmer urges all sides in Middle East to ‘step back from the brink’

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UK prime minister tells parliament that the first anniversary of 7 October Hamas attack is a ‘day of grief’ for region

Keir Starmer has urged all sides to pull back from the brink in the Middle East as he addressed the House of Commons on the anniversary of the 7 October attack by Hamas on Israel.

With Israel yet to decide how to respond to Iran’s unprecedented missile strike last week, the prime minister said he supported “Israel’s right to defend herself against Iran’s aggression, in line with international law”.

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Israel launches intense wave of airstrikes on 120 sites in Lebanon

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Military says 100 aircraft used in attack on targets in south of country as Israeli operations expand on multiple fronts

Israel launched an intense wave of air raids on southern Lebanon on Monday, with 100 aircraft targeting about 120 sites in the space of an hour, according to the country’s military.

An IDF Arabic spokesperson issued an urgent warning to Lebanese civilians to avoid being on the beach or on boats on the coast from the Awali River southward until further notice.

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Israel marks October 7 with memorials and protests, as attacks on Lebanon and Gaza continue

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The Israeli military said it struck Hezbollah intelligence and weapons storage, as rocket hits Haifa injuring at least 5 people

Ceremonies were held across Israel on Monday as the country marked the first anniversary of the October 7 Hamas attacks, with the war it launched in response raging in Gaza and escalating in Lebanon, while conflict threatened to spread across the Middle East.

In the hours leading up to the anniversary, Israel bombed targets in Beirut and Gaza, while Hezbollah rockets struck Haifa, Israel’s third-largest city, causing damage to buildings, police said. Israeli media reported 5 people were wounded in rocket attacks in Haifa and the city of Tiberias.

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Israel on high alert for 7 October as it escalates Gaza and Lebanon conflicts

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Overnight Israeli strikes hit Beirut’s southern suburbs, while at least 10 people were reportedly injured after a Hezbollah rocket hit the city of Haifa

Israel will hold memorials for the first anniversary of the October 7 attacks on Monday as the war it launched in response escalates on two fronts, with heavy bombing raids and mass evacuation orders issued in Lebanon and Gaza amid the growing possibility of a retaliatory airstrike against Iran.

As Israelis across the country prepared to mark one year since Hamas launched its devastating attack, a region that has spiralled into unprecedented crisis was on high alert. In Israel, authorities said they were on the lookout for attacks timed to coincide with the anniversary after a gunman opened fire on pedestrians in a central bus station in a city in the Negev desert, killing one and wounding 10 in the second attack in the last week.

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Middle East crisis: Iran confirms resumption of air traffic – as it happened

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This blog has now closed. You can see all our coverage of the Israel-Gaza war: one year on here and all our coverage of the Israel-Lebanon conflict here.

The death toll from the Israeli strike on the Gaza mosque has risen to 24, according to local authorities. The Hamas-run Gaza government media office said 93 people were also wounded in the strikes on the mosque and the school, near the Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.

The al-Aqsa Martyrs hospital told the Associated Press that the strike hit a mosque sheltering displaced people. Eyewitnesses told Reuters the same. However Israeli forces say the mosque was being used as a Hamas command and control centre “to plan and carry out terrorist operations against the IDF forces and the State of Israel”, and that it took steps to reduce the chance of harming civilians. An AP reporter counted 18 bodies at the hospital morgue, and said hospital records listed all those killed as men.

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Netanyahu hits out at Macron over call for halt to arms exports to Israel

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Israeli prime minister turns on French counterpart’s continuing efforts towards a ceasefire and end to violence in Lebanon

A call by Emmanuel Macron for a halt in arms supplies to Israel for use in Gaza has been met with an angry rebuttal from the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

The French president’s comments were directed mainly at the US and were part of continuing French efforts to revive its call for a ceasefire in Lebanon.

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Three hospitals in Lebanon forced to close amid Israeli bombing

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Healthcare workers have been displaced and paramedics killed in the south of the country

Three hospitals in south Lebanon were forced to close on Friday after Israeli bombings struck two and the other ran out of supplies, displacing a number of doctors from the area and creating concerns around the state of the Lebanese health sector.

Marjayoun governmental hospital and the Salah Ghandour hospital in Bint Jbeil, large healthcare centres along the eastern and western sections of the Lebanese borders, announced their closure after their premises were struck, killing seven and wounding 14 healthcare workers.

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Israel ‘preparing response’ to Iran attack as 7 October anniversary looms

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Military also ordering civilians in two Gaza camps to evacuate, while operations in Lebanon continue to ramp up

The Israeli military is expanding its operations on multiple fronts around the anniversary of the 7 October attacks on Monday, including planning for a “significant and serious” retaliation against Iran for last week’s large-scale ballistic missile attack on Israel.

Signs of imminent Israeli retaliation against Iran came as the French president, Emmanuel Macron, called for an international embargo on arms delivered to Israel for use against Gaza, where authorities say more than 41,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s year long assault.

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Middle East crisis live: night of bombing in south Beirut; IDF confirms Gaza mosque strike

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Israeli army issued evacuation warnings on Saturday to people in the south of Lebanese capital; Israel says Deir al-Balah mosque in Gaza was Hamas site

At least 41,825 Palestinians have been killed and 96,910 wounded in Israel’s military offensive on Gaza since 7 October, the territory’s health authorities said on Saturday.

A South Korean military transport aircraft returned 97 citizens and family members from Lebanon on Saturday as Middle East tensions rise, the foreign ministry said.

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UK charters another flight from Lebanon and urges Britons to leave

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Foreign secretary and PM call on nationals and their dependants to evacuate on Sunday’s flight, the last one scheduled for now

A new flight has been chartered by the UK government for British nationals to leave Lebanon on Sunday, amid the growing conflict in the region.

More than 250 UK citizens have left Lebanon on government-chartered flights amid the conflict, the Foreign Office said. The UK chartered a fourth flight to leave Beirut-Rafic Hariri airport in Beirut on Sunday.

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Blasts shake Beirut’s southern suburbs as Israeli military urges evacuations

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Explosions and smoke reported in capital early on Saturday while Hezbollah says clashes continue with Israeli troops in Lebanon border area

A series of explosions were heard over Beirut’s southern suburbs early on Saturday after the Israeli military demanded evacuations for some areas while Hezbollah said it was engaged in continued clashes with Israeli troops in the Lebanon border area.

Israel said on Friday it had targeted the intelligence headquarters of Hezbollah in Beirut and was assessing the damage after a series of strikes on senior figures in the militant group that Iran’s supreme leader condemned as counterproductive.

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‘You need to go’: up to 500 Australians prepare for evacuation from Lebanon amid government warnings

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Two charter flights are expected to fly out of Beirut on Saturday as list of people seeking to leave grows

Up to 500 Australians and their close relatives are due to be boarded on to two charter flights out of Beirut on Saturday, amid increased government efforts to expatriate citizens after Israel’s ground incursion into Lebanon’s south.

The first flight was expected to fly out of the Lebanese capital and land in Cyprus at about 11.30am local time (6.30pm AEST). From there, two Qantas flights can take passengers to Sydney on Tuesday and Wednesday.

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More blasts in Beirut after Israel demands new evacuations – as it happened

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This blog is now closed. Our latest live blog is here. See all our Middle East crisis coverage

The Israeli military launched a series of strikes on southern Beirut on Thursday night, in one of the most intense bombardments on the city since the campaign began last week.

A source close to Hezbollah told the AFP news agency that Israel had conducted 11 consecutive strikes on the group’s stronghold in the Lebanese capital.

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Iran’s Ali Khamenei vows Hezbollah and Hamas will not back down

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In rare public address, supreme leader defends missile attack on Israel and makes appeal for Muslim unity

Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has vowed that Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza will re-emerge strongly with new leaders, as an Israeli airstrike cut Lebanon’s main route to Syria.

In a rare public sermon in front of tens of thousands in Tehran on Friday, Khamenei defended the “legal and legitimate” ballistic missile attack on Israel this week that Iran has said was in retaliation for the deaths of the Hezbollah secretary general, Hassan Nasrallah, and the Hamas political leader, Ismail Haniyeh.

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Israel launches intense attacks on Hezbollah stronghold in Beirut’s south

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Reports suggest strikes were targeting Hashem Safieddine, seen as most likely candidate to replace Hassan Nasrallah

The Israeli military launched a series of strikes on southern Beirut on Thursday night, in one of the most intense bombardments on the city since the campaign began last week as Hezbollah continued to attack northern Israel.

The raids came as Israel also cut off a key road near to Lebanon’s Masnaa border crossing with Syria that has been used by hundreds of thousands of people to flee Israeli bombardments in recent days.

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UK Palestinians on the nightmare of watching war unfold from afar

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One year on, we speak to those who have lost more than 50 relatives and who call some ministers’ support for the Israeli government ‘shameful’

In September 2023, 45-year-old Mohammed Ghalayini travelled to Gaza from Manchester, where he had lived since 2004, to visit family. He was still there on 7 October when Hamas’s attack on Israel killed 1,200 people. In Israel’s subsequent bombardment of Gaza – which to date has killed more than 41,000 people – he and his family were displaced multiple times, faced shortages of food and water, and endured the relentless sound of drones.

Ghalayini is now back in the north of England, but nearly a year into Israel’s war in Gaza, he says every day still brings bad news – whether from family members in WhatsApp messages, or in updates on Facebook, which has become like an “obituary page”. Ghalayini said he feels helpless.

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Israel orders evacuation of southern Lebanese city as Beirut strikes continue

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People of Nabatieh are told to leave, adding to mass displacement, and multiple airstrikes are heard in capital

The Israeli military has ordered evacuations of a Lebanese city and other communities north of a UN-declared buffer zone, signalling that it may widen a ground operation launched earlier this week against Hezbollah.

On Thursday, Israel told people to leave Nabatieh, a provincial capital in southern Lebanon, and several towns and villages north of the Litani River, which formed the northern edge of the border zone established by the UN security council after the 2006 war in a resolution that both sides have accused the other of violating.

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Biden says US ‘discussing’ possible Israeli plans to attack Iran’s oil industry

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President’s off-the-cuff remark outside White House over possible retaliation triggers global oil price rise

Joe Biden has said that his administration has been “discussing” possible Israeli plans to attack Iran’s oil industry in retaliation for the Iranian ballistic missile attack on Tuesday.

Biden’s off-the-cuff remark did not make clear whether his administration was holding internal discussions or talking directly to Israel, nor did he clarify what his attitude was to such an attack.

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