Author: popcorn563

Lebanese people took to the streets on Tuesday to protest against the deteriorating economic and social conditions in different regions of the country. The protests coincided with the presence of European judges in the Justice Palace in Beirut investigating the central bank and Riad Salameh, its governor, over alleged corruption, money laundering, tax evasion, and use of forged documents. A French judicial delegation is also in Lebanon to investigate the Beirut port explosion. The delegation met on Tuesday with Judge Ghassan Oueidat, Lebanon’s prosecutor general, in the presence of Judge Sabouh Sleiman, the assistant prosecutor general. The French authorities had…

Lebanon has been stripped of its voting rights at the UN General Assembly for failing to pay its annual dues. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the government in Beirut must pay arrears of about $1.8 million to regain its status. Other countries that lost the right to vote were Dominica, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, South Sudan and Venezuela. Under UN rules, a country can lose its vote if it is in arrears of at least two years’ contributions, unless it shows evidence that it cannot pay for reasons beyond its control. Lebanon has been mired in economic chaos since 2019, when its…

Lebanon vowed to restore its payments to the UN’s operating budget on Friday after losing its right to vote in the 193-member UN General Assembly, according to the country’s state-owned National News Agency (NNA). Lebanon is one of six countries to lose its right to vote for not meeting minimum contributions, along with Venezuela, South Sudan, Gabon, Dominica and Equatorial Guinea, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said in a letter on Thursday. In response to the suspension, Lebanon’s Foreign Ministry said on Friday that the payment process “will take place immediately,” NNA said. “The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Emigrants…

Israel will combat any Iranian attempt to place military bases on its borders with Lebanon and Syria, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said as he toured the North with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on Wednesday. “The main enemy we face is the terrorist regime in Iran and its entrenchment in Syria and Lebanon,” Netanyahu said. “We are determined to fight Iran’s attempts to develop a nuclear arsenal… and any attempt by Iran to establish a base against us on our northern military border in Syria. “And we will remind those who need to be reminded of our red lines in this…

Former deputy Supreme Court Justice president Elyakim Rubinstein warned that a controversial package of sweeping legal reforms proposed by Justice Minister Yariv Levin would leave Israel with just one branch of government, the executive, and hollow out Israeli democracy, joining a growing outcry against the planned overhaul. Speaking to The Times of Israel, Rubinstein said he understood the desire to formalize the authority of the High Court of Justice through a Basic Law for legislation, but said he disagreed with almost all the proposals for such a measure being advanced by Levin and the new government. Last week, Levin introduced…

WASHINGTON (JTA) — With a new right-wing government in Israel raising alarm bells among many in the United States, the timing seemed ripe for a gathering by AIPAC, which regularly convenes bigwigs to talk about the US-Israel relationship. But the group’s conference this week in Washington is focusing not on that relationship but on American electoral politics. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s “Political Leadership Forum” on Monday and Tuesday was closed to press. But it offers the latest signal of how the group’s activities have evolved from the days when its policy conferences were feel-good affairs that sought to…

The preceding defense minister, Benny Gantz, has said in a remarkably timely and substantive statement that a military strike against Iranian nuclear facilities is possible within two or three years. The statement has attracted considerable attention from observers and experts because it is a direct statement by the then-defense minister, even though his term was coming to an end or, unusually, his last official statement concerned a timetable for an anticipated war. Graduating a group of Israeli Air Force pilots, he told them, “In two or three years, you may be crossing the skies to the east to participate in…