Spotlight
German airline Lufthansa will resume flights to Tel Aviv in Israel later this week. The company announced Tuesday that it would offer flights to Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport starting on Thursday.
Flights to the Lebanese capital, Beirut, will remain suspended until Sept. 30 for all airlines in the Lufthansa Group, which also includes Swiss, Austrian Airlines, Brussels Airlines and Eurowings.
Full StoryParliament Speaker Nabih Berri is not worried about his presidential dialogue initiative, sources close to Berri told Annahar.
"Berri is assured that 86 MPs will participate in his dialogue," the sources said in remarks published Monday, adding that he will not immediately call for it as he hopes that Lebanese Forces Party leader Samir Geagea will change his mind and accept to attend the presidential dialogue.
Full StoryU.S. mediator Amos Hochstein will likely visit the region this month to reach a final agreement on the United Nations Council Resolution 1701.
A high-ranking diplomat told al-Liwaa newspaper, in remarks published Monday, that Hochstein has received the official Lebanese response regarding the implementation of Resolution 1701 once the Gaza war is over.
Full StoryIsraeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant has said that Israel intends to maintain its attacks on Hezbollah until it manages to return the residents of northern Israel to their homes.
“The price we are paying will not go in vain and we will keep striking (Hezbollah) until we return the residents of the north,” Gallant said during a visit to the occupied Golan Heights.
Full StoryThe five-nation group for Lebanon has returned the Lebanese presidential file to the spotlight through a series of meetings aimed at “convincing the parties to go to dialogue,” al-Akhbar newspaper reported on Monday.
The quintet “is convinced that no breakthrough will occur except through direct dialogue and in agreement with Speaker Nabih Berri,” the daily said.
Full StoryTwo people were killed Monday in an Israeli strike on a vehicle in southern Lebanon, according to the health ministry, with a Lebanese security source saying the car belonged to a U.N.-contracted company.
"The Israeli enemy's strike targeting a car in Naqoura left two dead," the health ministry said, without specifying whether they were civilians.
Full StoryResidents of Beirut's southern suburbs have been scrambling to make contingency plans since an Israeli airstrike on an apartment building in a busy neighborhood killed a top Hezbollah commander and touched off fears of a full-scale war.
For most, that means moving in with relatives or renting homes in Christian, Druze or Sunni-majority areas of Lebanon that are generally considered safer than the Shiite-majority areas where Hezbollah has its main base of support.
Full StoryThe head of the Christian political party Lebanese Forces has accused Hezbollah of dragging the country into a war with Israel without consulting the people.
In a speech attacking the Shiite Muslim group, Samir Geagea, who heads the main Christian bloc in parliament, accused Hezbollah of "confiscating the Lebanese people's decision on war and peace, as if there were no state".
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Free Patriotic Movement chief Jebran Bassil has said that the FPM has always called for “consensus” and “dialogue” among the Lebanese over the presidential file.
Full StoryParliament Speaker Nabih Berri has stressed that the presidential file is “a domestic constitutional juncture that has nothing to do with the situations related to the Israeli aggression, whether in Gaza or in the Lebanese south.”
“We were the first to call … for all political and parliamentary parties to seize the current moment that the region is going through in order to finalize the presidential juncture as soon as possible, under the constitution’s ceiling and through consultations among everyone, without dictations or vetoes on anyone,” Berri said in a speech marking the 46th anniversary of the disappearance of Imam Moussa al-Sadr and his two companions.
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