Hezbollah chief calls for strategy to confront Israel

AL JAZEERA
December 12, 2017

Dec 12: The leader of Lebanon's Hezbollah has said his group and its allies in the region would renew their focus on the Palestinian cause after what he called their victories elsewhere in the region.

Hassan Nasrallah called on Hezbollah's allies on Monday to put in place a united strategy "in the field" to confront Israel.

His speech came as thousands of Hezbollah supporters demonstrated in Beirut, chanting "Death to America!" and "Death to Israel!" in protest against President Donald Trump's decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel's capital.

Hezbollah, an Iran-backed Lebanese Shia political bloc with a powerful military wing, has been fighting in Syria alongside regional allies to defeat both anti-government rebels and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group.

Protesters marched through Hezbollah's south Beirut bastion, carrying banners reading "Jerusalem, Eternal Capital of Palestine" and "Jerusalem is Ours".

Nasrallah said he hoped the "foolish [US] decision" would mark the "beginning of the end" of Israel.

Days of protest

Al Jazeera's Zeina Khodr, reporting from Beirut on Monday, said Nasrallah asked Hezbollah supporters to continue protesting against the US move.

"Nasrallah described Trump's decision as yet another aggression against the Palestinian cause whose aim was to strip Palestinians of their rights," she said.

Nasrallah had called for the demonstration last week after Trump made his announcement in a televised speech on December 6.

The move has been heavily denounced and has prompted days of protest across the Middle East and elsewhere.

Monday's rally came a day after a violent protest outside the US embassy in Beirut, where security forces fired tear gas and water cannon at protesters who pelted them with stones.

The demonstrators were barely hundreds of metres from the embassy.

Lebanon is home to over 450,000 Palestinian refugees, who make up nearly 10 percent of the country's population.

Many are the descendants of those who fled after the creation of Israel in 1948.

Our correspondent said Trump's decision has been a gift to Hezbollah, which had been drawing flak from its opponents for its intervention in Syria's conflict.

The battle-hardened Hezbollah fighters played a key role in turning the tide of Syria's war in favour of President Bashar al-Assad, a key Iran ally.

"From the beginning, since Hezbollah was born three decades ago, Palestine has been central to their cause," Al Jazeera's Khodr said.

"Up until a few years ago, Hezbollah was portrayed as a resistance movement.

"But it lost a lot of popularity and legitimacy when it intervened in Syria, with its opponents accusing it of being a sectarian militia that is serving Iran's interests.

"Now Hezbollah is saying they have won against ISIL, that the war in Syria is winding down and they have to concentrate on their main cause, the Palestinian issue."

Hezbollah is believed to have a massive arsenal of rockets capable of hitting much of Israel's territory.

Israel fought a war against Hezbollah in Lebanon in 2006 that killed more than 1,200 Lebanese, mostly civilians, and 120 Israelis, most of them soldiers.

Israel withdrew its forces from southern Lebanon in 2000, ending a 22-year occupation, but the two countries remain technically at war and there have been occasional skirmishes on the border.

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Agencies
May 26,2020

Dubai, May 26: An Indian expat, who recently recovered from COVID-19, fell to his death from a building in Dubai, police said.

The 26-year-old Indian national identified as Neelath Muhammed Firdous from Kerala, fell from the seventh floor balcony of his building where he stayed with six others including his uncle, Naushad Ali, 33.

A Dubai Police official confirmed the incident to Gulf News on Monday and said it had been a suicide.

"He was suffering from a mental disorder and there is no criminal suspicions behind his death," said the official.

"The incident happened on Sunday," the official confirmed.

The victim's relative said: "(He) awoke early to perform prayers and everyone was getting on with their daily morning chores when he walked to the balcony and jumped.

"He was suffering from a mental disorder and had been disturbed for some time. He thought everyone was out to attack him and had stopped eating his food as he thought people were feeding him poison. He was refusing to even take water from us."

The victim had tested positive for COVID-19 on April 10. On May 7, he was discharged from a Dubai hospital after clearing all tests.

The relative told Gulf News that he had registered the victim in the Department of Non-Resident Keralites Affairs (NORKA) last month in order to repatriate him, however he was unsuccessful in procuring a ticket.

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News Network
January 9,2020

Srinagar, Jan 9: Envoys from 15 countries including the United States were shown around Srinagar on Thursday, the first visit by New Delhi-based diplomats since the government stripped Kashmir of its semi-autonomous status and began a harsh crackdown five months ago.

The diplomats were driven by Indian authorities in a motorcade amid tight security from the airport to the military headquarters in Srinagar, where they were briefed on the security situation, an army officer said. He spoke on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to speak to reporters.

They also held discussions with civil society members and some Kashmiri politicians, said Raveesh Kumar, spokesman for the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).

The objective of the visit, organized by the Union government, was for the envoys to see first-hand “how things have progressed and how normalcy has been restored to a large extent'' in Kashmir since August, Kumar told reporters in New Delhi.

In October, a group of European Parliament members had visited the region, which is claimed by both India and Pakistan.

The delegation that visited Kashmir on Thursday included US ambassador to India Kenneth Juster and diplomats from Bangladesh, Vietnam, Norway, the Maldives, South Korea, Morocco, Niger, Nigeria, Argentina, the Philippines, Fiji, Uzbekistan, Peru and Togo.

Offices, shops and businesses were open in Srinagar on the cold winter day, but the diplomats did not stop to talk to people as they moved to different venues of their meetings.

They were to fly to Jammu, the winter capital of Kashmir, later Thursday and return to New Delhi on Friday.

Congress leader Jairam Ramesh pointed out the oddity of taking foreign diplomats to the troubled state but not allowing allowing Indian political leaders to freely visit it.

The National Conference said it was "disappointed" with the way the government brought envoys from various countries to "endorse" its "claims of normalcy" in the union territory. The party alleged that it was no more than a "guided tour" with access limited to "handpicked individuals who toe the government line".

“The NC wishes to ask these envoys that if the situation in Jammu & Kashmir is "normal", then why are scores of people, including three former chief ministers, under detention for almost 160 days and why have the people been denied access to the internet for over 5 months?" a statement issued by the party said.

Kumar dismissed as unfounded criticism of the visit, and said more such visits to Kashmir by New Delhi-based diplomats are likely in the near future.

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News Network
July 11,2020

New Delhi, Jul 11: India's COVID-19 case count crossed the eight lakh-mark on Saturday with yet another highest single-day spike of 27,114 new cases in the last 24 hours.

As many as 519 deaths were reported during this period.

The total number of positive cases in the country stands at 8,20,916, including 2,83,407 active cases, 5,15,386 cured/discharged/migrated and 22,123 deaths, according to the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.

With as many as 2,38,461 COVID-19 cases, Maharashtra continues to remain the worst-affected state, followed by Tamil Nadu (1,30,261) and Delhi (1,09,140).

Meanwhile, 1,13,07,002 samples have been tested for COVID-19 till July 10. Out of these 2,82,511 samples were tested yesterday, according to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR).

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