Israel bombs south Lebanon ahead of second cabinet meeting on Hezbollah arms, Six Lebanese soldiers killed in explosion in southern Lebanon, Netanyahu holds first press conference after approving Gaza plan, Israeli security cabinet chose starvation policy in Gaza over deal to free captives, Ultra-Orthodox media declares uprising in Israel over mandatory conscription of Haredim, Indonesia to allocate uninhabited island for ‘treatment’ of wounded Palestinians, Israel signs largest-ever gas export deal with Egypt worth up to $35 billion, Microsoft helping Israel spy on millions of Palestinians since 2021, Lebanon passes bank resolution law, but IMF concerns remain, Nearly 10,000 killed in Syria since militant Islamist Ahmad al-Sharaa seized power, Turkiye rejects Suwayda–SDF corridor citing threat to so-called Syrian unity, Armenia and Azerbaijan sign peace deal, US gains control of Zangezur corridor, UAE bars Sudanese flights after Khartoum downs Emirati plane transporting Colombian mercenaries
All the factors are there for it to break out. The country is in suspense, waiting for any casus belli. Perhaps the confessional belonging of the soldiers killed in Saturday’s explosion, perhaps an excessively violent army crackdown on Hezbollah’s protesters in the streets. Yet, still nothing: Lebanon has not yet entered another open phase of its decades-long civil war.
In a multi-faith country organized on sectarian lines, with the sharing of power between different political forces belonging to different confessions – and the same representation reflected in all institutions, including the army; a country in which – with the exception of the missiles that only Hezbollah holds, and will not hold for long – all political parties can count on men with light weapons, as the clashes in Tayouneh in October 2021 have shown; that in this country where the Party of God still holds 25 per cent of the consensus, an American plan for disarmament is being approved, at a time when America is the main financier of the enemy that continues to bomb and occupy the southern territories; that in this country, at this very moment, there is talk of sovereignty – seems surreal.
During an extraordinary meeting on Thursday, the Lebanese Council of Ministers finally approved the objectives set out in the US document presented in Morocco by the Trump administration. On the agenda: the proposal presented by White House envoy Tom Barrack on the disarmament of Hezbollah by the end of the year. The plan, divided into four phases, provides for the total disarmament of Hezbollah, the withdrawal of the Israeli army from the five occupied Lebanese villages near the border, the end of Israeli bombing in Lebanon, the release of Lebanese prisoners, the precise definition of the border between Lebanon and Israel and between Lebanon and Syria, international support for the Lebanese army, and the start of reconstruction with funds mainly from the US, France, Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
All Shiite ministers in the Lebanese government withdrew from the cabinet session. Labor Minister Mohammad Haidar, of Hezbollah, said: “It is not possible to talk about disarming the resistance until the enemy has withdrawn, the prisoners have been returned, the attacks have ended and reconstruction has begun”; a statement echoed by that of Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, who claimed: “What is required is a minimum of realism, otherwise hide yourselves. But if they insist on taking the scenario to the extreme, let them implement what they approved – if they can.”
Already on Wednesday, Hezbollah denounced the government’s “grave sin” in deciding to permanently disarm the Party of God. Amal, the other face of the Lebanese Shiite duo, accused the government of “making gratuitous concessions to the enemy.” And a popular movement of civil disobedience has crossed the country between Thursday and Friday, with dozens of motorcycle convoys whose drivers and passengers, waving Hezbollah’s flags and its late leader Hassan Nasrallah’s pictures, traveled through various areas of the country, notably the southern suburbs of Beirut, openly calling for a mass mobilization “to raise your voices in defense of the weapons that have safeguarded the homeland,” as the statement of the self-proclaimed ‘Youth of Dahieh’ read.
And yet all eyes are on the risk of yet another internal conflict. Another fratricide, for a nation whose invisible internal borders have caused fraternity to be forgotten: even in the darkest days. As the Deputy Head of the Supreme Islamic Shia Council rightly stated: “Barrack achieved his goal of shifting the confrontation from Lebanese-Israeli to a political confrontation within the government.” It is in fact out of doubt that Washington’s pressure has forced Beirut into a dangerous binary: fight a war with Israel, or fight a war at home with Hezbollah.
Given all the highly sensitive differences involved, as one senior Lebanese diplomat has put it, it would be like asking the Lebanese army – historically funded by the US at a ratio of 1:1000 compared to what the US provides to Israel, totally lacking in military resources, totally immobile in the face of Israeli bombing, and totally subjugated – to do to Hezbollah what even Israel couldn’t do to Hamas in a smaller space, and with warplanes. While Berri’s defiant words echo: “If they can.”
And while Israel keeps on violating the terms of the truce on a daily basis – with around 800 unilateral breaks of the ceasefire since last November – and expands the military bases it began building in the new positions occupied during the last war; while civilians continue to be killed under the no longer credible pretext of Israeli self-defense – given that Hezbollah’s missile attacks ceased completely months ago; while journalists are still being targeted as if they were military targets, the goal of the Lebanese army – completely subjugated to Israeli violence – becomes to silence civil unrest. Not much different from when, at the peak of last fall’s internal displacement, instead of defending the national southern borders, it was busy evacuating desperate people who had no place in official shelters, from Ramlet el-Baida, Horsh Beirut, Martyrs’ Square. The sad image of “what they can.”
On Saturday, the Lebanese Army stated that it will tolerate no violation “of security or civil peace,” nor any road closures, in response to the previous evening’s demonstrations by Hezbollah supporters protesting the government’s decision to disarm the party-militia by the end of the year: seven people were briefly arrested on the sidelines of the convoys.
If only the army could show a similar force to secure, more than the invisible borders between a Christian and a Shiite neighborhood, the country’s southern ones. Meanwhile, the Israeli bombardment of the country does not subside. Just during the Council of Ministers, a raid on the western region of Baalbek killed an engineer, Alaa Hani Haidar, while he was walking in the village of Kfar Dan. Also in the Beqaa, along the border with Syria, a car was hit by a drone, killing six people and injuring ten. More bombings hit Mahmoudia, Tefahta and the town of Ansar. The day before, a strike in Touline killed a 11-year-old kid. On Friday, another one targeted a journalist while driving along the Zahrani road in Nabatieh district. And just last night, an explosion was caused by a house detonation operation by the Israeli army in Khiam.
In Lebanon
Deadly explosion: Six Lebanese soldiers have been killed in an explosion as they were inspecting a Hezbollah weapons depot in southern Lebanon, the military has announced on Saturday, August 9. In a statement released in the same day, the Lebanese army said the unit was dismantling the contents of the depot in the Wadi Zibqin area, in the Tyre region, when the explosion occurred. It said other soldiers were injured but did not specify how many.
The deadly explosion comes as the Lebanese government last week approved United States-backed plans to disarm Hezbollah – a move the Lebanese group has rejected, saying such demands serve Israeli interests. It also comes just days after Andrea Tenenti, a spokesperson for UN peacekeepers in Lebanon, said troops had “discovered a vast network of fortified tunnels” in the same area.
The Lebanese army has been working with the United Nations peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon (UNIFIL) to dismantle Hezbollah military infrastructure as part of a ceasefire deal with Israel that came into force in November.
UN spokesperson Farhan Haq had told reporters that peacekeepers and Lebanese troops found “three bunkers, artillery, rocket launchers, hundreds of explosive shells and rockets, anti-tank mines and about 250 ready-to-use improvised explosive devices”.
Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said in a social media post on Saturday that “Lebanon mourns” the soldiers who were killed “while fulfilling their national duty.” Diodato Abagnara, head of the UNIFIL mission, also expressed condolences to the troops and their families. “Several dedicated Lebanese soldiers were killed and others injured, simply doing their job to restore stability and avoid a return to open conflict,” Abagnara wrote on X.
Massive airstrikes: Massive Israeli airstrikes targeted several areas in the south of Lebanon late on Thursday, August 7, with Tel Aviv claiming it attacked Hezbollah’s “attempts to restore terrorist infrastructure.” The Israeli army said on Thursday that it “attacked terrorist targets of the Hezbollah terrorist organization in southern Lebanon,” including “weapons warehouses, a launcher, and the organization’s infrastructure where engineering tools used for restoring terrorist infrastructure in the area were stored.”
“The Hezbollah terrorist organization continues attempts to restore terrorist infrastructure throughout Lebanon, endangering Lebanese civilians and using them as human shields. The presence of weapons and Hezbollah terrorist organization activity in the area constitutes a violation of the understandings between Israel and Lebanon,” the Israeli army added.
Israeli attacks on the town of Deir Siryan on Wednesday night killed a Syrian national and injured two other people, Al-Akhbar’s correspondent reported on Thursday. Israeli drones bombed Deir Siryan at least five times, and prevented ambulances from advancing.
Bombing also targeted Mahmoudia and the town of Ansar. Video footage showed large explosions as a result of the attacks, which came a day before the Lebanese cabinet was expected to meet for the second time this week to discuss Hezbollah’s weapons. Earlier on Wednesday, an 11-year-old boy was killed in an Israeli drone strike in south Lebanon.
Disarmament before peace: On Tuesday, the cabinet met and adopted a decision calling for Hezbollah to disarm, without prioritizing an end to Israeli attacks and a withdrawal of Israeli forces from the five occupied hills in southern Lebanon.
Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said the Lebanese army has been tasked with drafting a plan to achieve a state monopoly on arms by the end of the year. He added that the plan must be presented to the Council of Ministers at the end of August. Hezbollah and Amal Movement ministers withdrew from the session in rejection of the decision. The Lebanese Shiite group said in a statement on August 6 that the government committed a “grave sin.”
“This decision undermines Lebanon’s sovereignty and gives Israel free rein to tamper with our security, geography, politics, and our very future. Therefore, we will treat this decision as if it does not exist. At the same time, we remain open to dialogue, to ending the Israeli aggression on Lebanon, liberating its land, freeing its captives, rebuilding what was destroyed by the brutal assault, and engaging in discussions over a national defense strategy – but not under the weight of aggression,” the duo stated.
Hezbollah Secretary-General Naim Qassem delivered a speech as the cabinet session took place on Tuesday, reaffirming the party’s refusal to surrender its weapons. The group has repeatedly said it is prepared to discuss incorporating its weapons into the state for a defensive strategy in which they could be used to defend the country from Israel. Hezbollah also stresses that this is purely an internal matter, and that no such discussions can begin until Israel ends its attacks and withdraws from the five points it occupied in south Lebanon since last year’s ceasefire.
The government decision follows months of heavy pressure from Washington, which reportedly demanded that the Lebanese cabinet adopt a decision to disarm Hezbollah.
The PFLP victims of Masnaa: The Israeli army on Thursday carried out a strike on two officials of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) in Masnaa, on the border between Lebanon and Syria. The attack killed six people and wounded 10, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry. On Friday, the Israeli army claimed responsibility for the strike, as reported by Haaretz. It marked the first time Israel has targeted the PFLP in Lebanon since the conflict began.
In a statement, the Israeli army said it had killed Mohammad Khalil Wishah, a senior PFLP figure who was “appointed head of the military and security department of the terrorist organization in Syria after his predecessor, Shantal al-Aal, was killed in a hideout in Beirut in September 2024.” The statement said Wishah had coordinated with other militant groups, strengthened ties with the resistance axis, and had recently been preparing military operations against Israeli targets. The PFLP confirmed Wishah’s death in a statement, identifying him as a Central Committee member. The group also said a field officer, Moufid Hassan Hussein, who was accompanying him, was also killed. The four other victims were civilians.
Wishah, also known as Abu Khalil, was born in Gaza in 1954 and joined the PFLP in 1973. He was imprisoned in Israel from 1973 to 1978, later studying in Egypt and Iraq before returning to Lebanon. In Beirut, he took part in battles during the 1982 Israeli invasion and fought in the Mountain War in 1983. According to the group, he held various leadership roles and attended numerous military training programs.
Moufid Hassan Hussein was born in 1973 in the Yarmouk Palestinian camp in Syria. He joined the PFLP in 1990 and was originally from the village of Zawia in the Safad region — now northern Israel. He held several technical and leadership roles and oversaw special operations, the group said.
On Friday, Palestinian Islamic Jihad also issued a statement expressing condolences and condemning the strike. “The Zionist enemy is waging an open war against the Palestinian people, its resistance forces, and its leaders,” it said, calling the attack a “new act of hostility against Lebanon and its people, as well as an infringement on its sovereignty.”
Among the four civilians killed in the strike was Shaker Janem, a resident of Manara in West Beqaa, who had been standing in front of a pharmacy at the time Yasser Ibrahim, and Shahoud, was a Syrian employee at Farrouj Chams restaurant. In a statement, the restaurant described Shahoud as “a model employee known for his kindness.” Video footage posted on social media showed the restaurant’s storefront shattered by the explosion. The third and fourth civilian victims have not yet been identified.
More killing: Later on Friday, August 8, Israel killed a journalist in a drone strike against a vehicle that was driving along the Zahrani road in Nabatieh district. The victim, identified as Mohammad Shehadeh, was reportedly also a member of Hezbollah, who Israel continues to attack despite a November cease-fire, killing more than 300 people since the supposed truce came into effect.
Shehadeh ran the online news outlet Hawana Lubnan, and Hezbollah announced Shehadeh had been killed “on the road to Jerusalem,” the phrase used by the party since October 2023 to refer to its members killed by Israel. Israel claimed, via a message posted by its Arabic-language spokesperson, that Shehadeh had been the head of intelligence of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan forces.
Throughout Friday morning, an Israeli drone flew over the villages of Zahrani in southern Lebanon, while overnight, a helicopter flew over the border villages of Maroun al-Ras, Aitaroun, Blida and Mais al-Jabal, in the eastern and central sectors. In the afternoon, an Israeli drone targeted a bulldozer on the outskirts of the village of Aitaroun, in the district of Bint Jbeil. After the attack, which did not cause any casualties, an Israeli drone dropped leaflets on the village claiming the bulldozer had been operating on behalf of Hezbollah, despite information from local residents to the contrary.
The Israeli army also attacked Civil Defense response teams with projectiles launched from a drone as they were on their way to extinguish fires in Jibbein, where another drone had fired incendiary grenades an hour earlier.
Wanted in Beqaa: A Lebanese Army unit, with the support of the Directorate of Intelligence, is carrying out extensive raids in the town of Brital, east of Baalbek, in search of wanted individuals. Three people were killed Wednesday in clashes between the Lebanese Army and suspected drug traffickers in the Sharawneh neighborhood of Baalbeck, including the infamous fugitive nicknamed ‘Abu Salleh.’ Abu Salleh had been on the run since previous clashes with the army, which killed a soldier, in 2022.
The Beqaa Valley, where weapons circulate widely while the state struggles to assert its authority, is often the scene of bloody clashes between rival clans, but also sometimes between the military and heavily armed gangs.
IMF concerns remain: Nearly six years into Lebanon’s financial crisis, Parliament approved the long-awaited bank resolution law on July 31, with its publication in the Official Gazette on August 7, marking a major step in banking reform. The measure is part of a broader package demanded by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which includes a revised banking secrecy law, pending anti–money laundering amendments, and the so-called “financial hole” bill to address sector losses.
While the IMF welcomed the adoption, it warned that several crucial recommendations were not incorporated. The law’s definition of a depositor remains vague, leaving unclear the guarantee of $100,000 per account — a key safeguard the IMF sought. Provisions on the High Banking Authority (HAB) preserve the presence of the National Deposit Guarantee Corporation, despite concerns over its independence, and allow politically influenced expert appointments without robust conflict-of-interest safeguards.
Other IMF priorities were also set aside. The law does not give the HAB’s objectives legal primacy over conflicting statutes, maintains Banque du Liban’s bank asset valuations at $84 billion without recognizing losses, and keeps multiple deferred-execution clauses despite calls to centralize implementation under a single provision tied to the “financial hole” law.
The law is a milestone in the reform process, but lingering gaps on independence, transparency, and financial realism could undermine its credibility — and Lebanon’s path toward restoring trust in its banking system.
In The Region
The ultimate plan: Thousands of protesters took to the streets of Tel Aviv on Saturday night to oppose Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to escalate the nearly two-year Gaza war, demanding an immediate end to the campaign and for the release of the hostages. A day earlier, the Prime Minister’s office said the security cabinet, a small group of senior ministers, had decided to seize Gaza City, expanding military operations in the devastated Palestinian territory despite widespread public opposition and warnings from the military the move could endanger the hostages.
The Israeli government has faced sharp criticism at home and abroad, including from some of its closest European allies, over the announcement that the military would expand the war. The full cabinet gave its approval on Sunday.
During a press conference on Sunday afternoon, Netanyahu stated that the new plan by the Israeli army to conquer the city of Gaza “is not aimed at occupying Gaza,” but Israel “has no other choice to finish the job,” and it is the “best way to end the war.” In his press conference, Netanyahu said the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) had been instructed to dismantle the “two remaining Hamas strongholds” in Gaza City and a central area around al-Mawasi.
He also outlined a three-step plan to increase aid in Gaza, including designating safe corridors for humanitarian aid distribution as well as more air drops by Israeli forces and other partners. He said the plan would also include increasing the number of safe distribution points managed by the controversial US and Israeli-backed Gazan Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).
The UN reported earlier this month that 1,373 Palestinians had been killed seeking food since late May, when GHF set up aid distribution sites. Netanyahu claimed Hamas had “violently looted the aid trucks,” and, when asked about Palestinians killed at GHF sites, said “a lot of firing was done by Hamas.”
The Israeli leader also took aim at the international press, saying it had bought into Hamas propaganda. He labelled some of the photos of malnourished children in Gaza that have run on newspaper front pages across the world as “fake.”
Throughout the war, Israel has not allowed international journalists into Gaza to report freely. But Netanyahu said a directive telling the military to bring in foreign journalists had been in place for two days. At the same time, its campaign to annihilate Gazans journalists in the Strip is still ongoing, after on the night of Sunday, a massive airstrike against Al-Jazeera journalists’ tent at Al-Shifa Hospital assassinated the entire crew in Gaza City. The victims were reporters Anas al-Sharif and Mohammad Qureiqaa, cameramen Ibrahim Zaher and Moamen Alaywa, and crew driver Mohammad Nofal.
Netanyahu rejects all deals: Hebrew media cited leaked documents showing that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu actively pursued a policy of starvation in a bid to bring about Hamas’s surrender. The documents also show that Netanyahu refused to move forward with Phase B of the last ceasefire deal – despite internal warnings urging him to secure a release of captives before returning to fighting. The documents confirmed that Netanyahu and the war cabinet “instructed the army to stop all humanitarian aid and close the Rafah crossing” in early March.
“The only chance to get hostages released is to discuss Phase B conditions,” Major General Nitzan Alon – who is in charge of the captives’ issue – told Ministers, according to the meeting records. Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar claimed that his preferred option is to reach Phase B. “We can resume the war afterward.” “If Hamas returns even a number of hostages – less than half – that’s excellent,” Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz was cited as saying. But Netanyahu refused and insisted the war would not end while Hamas remained in power.
Also Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich lashed out at Ministers, saying they are “misleading the public into thinking we can stop the war and return to it later. That’s ignorance,” according to the leaked documents.
The report also confirms that Hamas acted in good faith. “We thought the talks would explode once we entered them – and that didn’t happen,” the documents cite Israeli Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer as saying.
However, Netanyahu rejected making a deal and bet on besieging and starving two million Palestinians in an effort to force Hamas to surrender. On March 18, the war resumed with intensity, collapsing the ceasefire and negotiations. “The report definitively proves what we’ve been saying for a year and a half – a comprehensive deal to bring all captives home was possible,” said the Israeli Hostages and Missing Families Forum.
Gaza is still starving: Months later, the Gaza Strip is now facing a widespread and unprecedented famine. Dozens of people, including children, have died from starvation in recent weeks, as Palestinians continue to be gunned down by soldiers while receiving minimal amounts of aid via the US-Israeli Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).
The Government Media Office in Gaza revealed as early as on August 4 that only 674 trucks of aid have entered the enclave over the previous eight days, amounting to just 14 percent of the 4,800 required to meet minimum humanitarian needs. This is despite Israel’s announcement on July 27 that it would allow aid to enter the strip. This amounts to an average of 84 trucks per day, far below the 600 daily trucks Gaza officials say are necessary to sustain basic health, food, and fuel services in light of what they describe as the “complete collapse of infrastructure” caused by Israel’s ongoing genocide.
According to the media office, the majority of aid trucks were looted due to the “security chaos systematically perpetuated by the occupation,” describing it as part of a deliberate strategy of “engineering chaos and starvation” aimed at dismantling Palestinian society and crushing its ability to survive.
Moreover, Yasser Abu Shabab – an Israeli-backed militia leader operating in Rafah under Tel Aviv’s protection and whose role is to undermine Hamas – is responsible for the looting of aid convoys. His gang is also responsible for scouting and securing territory ahead of Israeli military operations. He has been accused of collaborating with Israel, drug trafficking, and links to ISIS.
The media office also condemned the occupation’s ongoing closure of crossings and its prevention of the entry of infant formula and humanitarian relief, holding Israel and its international allies “fully responsible for the worsening humanitarian catastrophe experienced by more than 2.4 million people in the Gaza Strip.”
The ultra-Orthodox uprising: Newspapers representing Israel’s ultra-Orthodox Jewish parties declared an ideological ‘war’ against the Israeli military for its efforts to enforce draft orders for Haredi men. Yated Neeman’s front page said simply “War,” and HaDerech’s read, “A war for God,” while saying Israel’s ultra-Orthodox Jews were “prepared for a fierce struggle.”
Haredi men in Israel have long enjoyed de facto exemptions from serving in the Israeli military, allowing them to study in Jewish religious seminaries known as Yeshivas instead. However, the Israeli military has begun to draft Haredi men in an effort to alleviate manpower shortages. Israel needs additional soldiers as military operations to effect the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza have now dragged on for almost two years, putting a strain on its largely reservist-based army.
The ideological ‘war’ was announced after two yeshiva students were arrested on Wednesday for evading the draft. Following the arrests, a spokesman for Rabbi Dov Lando, spiritual leader for the United Torah Judaism party’s Degel HaTorah faction, said Israel had “declared war on yeshiva students.” HaMevaser newspaper railed against the “conscription decree,” saying the enemies of the Jewish people are “rising up to destroy us.”
Ultra-Orthodox Jewish men have enjoyed draft exemptions for decades. However, the High Court of Justice struck down the exemptions last year, allowing the army to begin sending out and enforcing draft orders. In response, the Shas and United Torah Judaism parties are seeking to pass legislation legalizing the de facto military draft exemptions.
The Haredi effort to avoid fighting in Gaza has angered members of Israel’s opposition parties. “An update for the readers of Yated Neeman: There is indeed a war in Israel, but it is in a different place, and people are actually being killed in it,” said opposition Leader Yair Lapid in a post on X. Knesset member Oded Forer from the Yisrael Beytenu party called the newspaper headlines a “desecration of God’s name.” He quoted a verse from the biblical Book of Numbers, which reads, “Shall your brothers go to war while you sit here?”
As many as 80,000 ultra-Orthodox men aged 18 to 24 have failed to register for the draft. At the same time, the Israeli military says it needs 12,000 new soldiers to continue the war in Gaza. On their side, Haredi leaders say military service is a threat to their way of life and that studying the Torah is a better way to support the state of Israel than fighting in the army.
A threat of irreversible deportation: Indonesia will convert a medical facility on the uninhabited island of Galang to treat around 2,000 wounded Palestinians from Gaza before returning them to the strip, the Indonesian presidential spokesman Hassan Nasibi announced last Thursday, August 7. “Indonesia will provide medical assistance to approximately 2,000 Gazans who have become victims of the war,” Nasibi said, adding that the patients will be returned to Gaza after their recovery. He stressed that this was not a displacement operation.
The Galang Island facility, located off Sumatra and south of Singapore, will also temporarily house family members of the wounded. “No one is currently living there,” Nasibi said. He did not provide a timeframe for the operation and referred further questions to the Foreign and Defense Ministries, which have not responded.
The announcement follows months of scrutiny over Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto’s previous offer to shelter wounded Palestinians. That proposal drew criticism from senior Indonesian clerics, who warned it resembled US President Donald Trump’s earlier plan to transfer Palestinians from Gaza permanently. At the time, Indonesia’s Foreign Ministry said it “strongly rejects any attempt to forcibly displace Palestinians.”
According to Axios, Israel’s Mossad chief, David Barnea, visited Washington in mid-July to seek US support for forcibly relocating Palestinians from Gaza to countries including Indonesia, Libya, and Ethiopia. The proposal was framed as voluntary, but legal experts in both countries warned of violations of international law.
Earlier in March, AP reported that Israeli and US officials approached Sudan, Somalia, and Somaliland to take in Palestinians. Sudan reportedly rejected the offer, while the others said they were unaware of any such talks.
A Financial Times investigation in August furtherly revealed that Boston Consulting Group, acting on behalf of Israeli business interests, modeled a plan to displace and forcibly relocate up to 25 percent of Gaza’s population to third countries, including Somalia, Jordan, and the UAE. The consultancy later disavowed the plan.
Under international law, forced displacement and coerced population transfers constitute war crimes. Human rights advocates and UN officials have condemned such proposals as ethnic cleansing. Yet, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich has publicly called for the population of Gaza to be displaced to foreign countries as part of what he described as a “victory plan.”
The Israeli-Egyptian deal: Israel’s Leviathan natural gas field has finalized the largest export deal in the country’s history, an agreement worth up to $35 billion to supply gas to Egypt, according to NewMed, one of the field’s partners. Located off Israel’s Mediterranean coast, Leviathan holds approximately 600 billion cubic meters (bcm) of reserves and will supply about 130 bcm to Egypt through 2040, or until the contracted volume is fully delivered.
Since 2020, Leviathan has already exported 23.5 bcm of gas to Egypt, NewMed noted. “This is the most strategically important export deal to ever occur in the eastern Mediterranean, and strengthens Egypt’s position as the most significant hub in the region,” said NewMed CEO Yossi Abu.
“This deal, made possible by our strong regional partnerships, will unlock further regional export opportunities, once again proving that natural gas and the wider energy industry can be an anchor for collaboration.”
The deal should ease an energy crisis in Egypt, which has spent billions of dollars on importing liquefied natural gas since its own supplies fell short of demand. Egypt’s production began declining in 2022, forcing it to abandon its ambitions to become a regional supply hub. It has increasingly turned to Israel to make up the shortfall – despite formally condemning its genocide in Gaza.
Armenia-Azerbaijan at peace: Azerbaijan and Armenia on Friday signed a US-brokered peace deal during a meeting with President Donald Trump. The deal grants the US exclusive development rights to the Zangezur corridor in the South Caucasus. “It’s a long time – 35 years – they fought and now they’re friends, and they’re going to be friends for a long time,” Trump said at a White House signing ceremony, alongside Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.
Trump announced that the two nations had agreed to end hostilities, establish diplomatic relations, and uphold each other’s territorial integrity.
According to Trump, Washington also signed separate agreements with each country to expand cooperation in energy, trade, and technology, including artificial intelligence. He added that restrictions on defense cooperation between Azerbaijan and the US had been lifted.
At the same time, Iran promised it will prevent the creation of the Zangezur Corridor “with or without Russia’s help,” a senior adviser to Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei stated on August 10, one day after the US and Armenia signed a deal giving Washington control of the strategic land route. While speaking with Tasnim News Agency, Ali Akbar Velayati said Iran is opposed to the so-called Zangezur corridor that is designed to create a transit route on Armenian soil connecting the Republic of Azerbaijan to its enclave, Nakhchivan.
The deal signed Friday at the White House between US President Donald Trump and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan will give the US a 99-year development lease on the corridor located along Armenia’s border with Iran. This will allow the US to station forces directly on Iran’s border.
Microsoft spies Palestinians: Israel has been using a Microsoft cloud platform to store massive amounts of data and intelligence on Palestinians in both the occupied West Bank and Gaza, according to a new investigation carried out by +972 Magazine, Local Call, and The Guardian. The investigation reveals that Microsoft’s chief executive met in 2021 with the commander of Israel’s notorious Unit 8200 – the military intelligence unit involved in the pager terror attacks against Lebanon and other covert operations across the region.
Unit 8200 chief Yossi Sariel convinced Microsoft’s Satya Nadella to grant Israeli military intelligence access to a “customized and segregated area” inside the Azure cloud platform, according to The Guardian. It then began building “a sweeping and intrusive system that collects and stores recordings of millions of mobile phone calls made each day by Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank.”
Microsoft says its chief executive was unaware of what data would be stored on the platform. Yet the report cites a cache of leaked Microsoft documents and interviews with nearly a dozen employees of the company and of Unit 8200 – revealing the storage of everyday communications and data on the daily lives of regular Palestinian civilians.
Three Unit 8200 sources said the platform helped pave the way for many deadly airstrikes in Gaza, and Israeli army operations in the occupied West Bank. Other sources say Tel Aviv needed Microsoft due to a lack of storage space and computing power to carry out its espionage plans.
The Guardian reported earlier this year that Israel relied on Microsoft tech for its genocidal campaign against Gaza. An internal review carried out by the company claimed “no evidence” that its Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems or cloud platforms were used for harm. “The company had held conversations with Israeli defense officials and stipulated how its technology should be used in Gaza, insisting Microsoft systems must not be employed for the identification of targets for lethal strikes,” a company source told The Guardian last week.
Unit 8200 sources confirmed, however, that “intelligence drawn from the enormous repositories of phone calls held in Azure had been used to research and identify bombing targets in Gaza.” “When planning an airstrike on an individual located within densely populated areas where high numbers of civilians are present, officers would use the cloud-based system to examine calls made by people in the immediate vicinity,” they added.
Israel has relied heavily on western tech firms for mass surveillance and attacks on Palestinians. In March, +972 Magazine and Local Call revealed that Unit 8200 developed a ‘Chat GPT-like’ tool programmed to compile massive collections of intercepted Palestinian communications. The tool was trained to understand colloquial Arabic and uses large amounts of Palestinian phone calls and text messages obtained through surveillance.
Advanced facial recognition technology has also played a leading role in the forced disappearance and abduction of scores of Palestinians in Gaza by Israel. Earlier this year, Google announced plans to acquire the Israeli cloud security startup Wiz in a $32 billion deal, a startup founded by members of Unit 8200. Last year, moreover, Google fired dozens of employees after they staged a series of sit-in protests across the US to oppose Project Nimbus, which aims to provide the Israeli army with advanced AI and cloud services.
Another 10,000 killed in Syria: The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) has documented the violent deaths of nearly 10,000 people in Syria since the former Al-Qaeda commander, Ahmad al-Sharaa, was installed in power in Damascus. After Sharaa toppled the government of former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad in December last year, he was widely praised. Since that time, his HTS-led security forces have gone on a killing spree targeting Syria’s minority groups.
SOHR reported on August 7 that “due to ongoing violence and violations by local and foreign actors, coupled with widespread security chaos,” at least 9,889 people have been killed since 8 December 2024, the day Damascus fell. The SORH said that 7,449 civilians were among the victims, including 396 children and 541 women. It also stressed that there has been no accountability for killings carried out by members of Syria’s new security forces and affiliated armed factions, while “in some cases, perpetrators are being covered up and facts are being distorted.”
The SOHR noted, for example, that the fact-finding committee formed to investigate the massacre of roughly 1,600 Alawite civilians in Syria’s coastal regions in March “did not provide results consistent with the facts,” and was released while government forces and affiliated factions were carrying out new massacres of Druze civilians in Suwayda.
At the same time, pro-government media have launched campaigns aimed at undermining any groups seeking to document or expose the human rights violations, including by “disseminating sectarian and inflammatory rhetoric” against specific religious minority groups. For example, media campaigns have been launched to deflect from the massacres by calling Alawites “remnants of the regime” of Bashar al-Assad, calling the Druze “collaborators” with Israel, and calling the Kurds “separatists.” In many videos posted online, Syrian government-affiliated fighters regularly refer to both Alawites and Druze as “pigs” before executing them in their homes and the street.
The SOHR stated as well that thousands of detainees – who have not had a proper trial or been allowed to appear before a judge – remain in prison. Among the detainees are people arrested after the fall of Assad, and others who were arrested during raids or at security checkpoints. Many of these detainees have no clear charges against them and are being arbitrarily detained without due process, SOHR added.
On August 5, SOHR reported that families of kidnapped civilians renewed calls for Syrian authorities to reveal the fate of young Alawite men taken from their homes without charges during the massacres on the coast in March. The missing detainees are from the villages of Hmeimim, Bustan al-Basha, Al-Qabo, and Al-Sanober. Families told SOHR activists that armed groups stormed houses and took the young men to an unknown location without explaining the reasons or issuing official arrest warrants. Since then, Syrian authorities have provided no information about their fate despite repeated demands from their families.
“A threat to Syrian unity”: At the same time, Turkiye expressed its rejection of efforts to open a corridor from Suwayda Governorate in southern Syria to areas occupied by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in the country’s northeast, saying that such plans pose a threat to Syria’s unity and undermine its transitional governance process.
Omer Celik, spokesman for Turkiye’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), said to reporters that Ankara is following with concern “attempts to circumvent” the agreement signed between the Syrian government and the SDF in March. The agreement calls for the SDF to integrate its administrative structures into Syrian state institutions, hand over control of oil fields, and integrate its armed forces into the official army within one year. “We are witnessing clear procrastination, and there are approaches that distort the course of events and target Syria’s unity and sovereignty,” Celik claimed.
He emphasized that Turkiye views any attempt to create a corridor from Suwayda to SDF-controlled areas as the implementation of “imperialist projects channeled through terrorist organizations.” Ankara views the SDF as an offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which it considers a terrorist group. The AKP spokesman also stressed that Ankara “will not accept the sabotage of the transitional phase in Syria and will take the necessary measures to protect its national security,” noting that his country “monitors these attempts with great sensitivity and will not tolerate them.”
Celik accused foreign entities of supporting the events in southern Syria, adding that “talk about a corridor between Suwadya and SDF-held areas is a Zionist demand presented under the guise of self-rule projects.” After helping install Sharaa in power in December, Israel has in fact occupied large swathes of additional land. It has used the claim that it is protecting the Druze from massacres carried out against them by Sharaa’s forces as a pretext to intervene in Syria. Yet Israel is clearly seeking to establish the so-called ‘David’s Corridor’ through southern Syria to link territory it occupies in the Golan Heights with Suwayda and the Kurdish-controlled northeast. According to political observers, the corridor would block Iran’s land bridge to Lebanon, curb Turkish influence in the region, and open vital oil and trade routes from Kurdish areas to Israel.
Sudan and the UAE in tension: Sudan’s aviation authority announced on Thursday, August 7, that its planes have been barred from landing in Emirati airports, after a UAE aircraft carrying mercenaries was targeted by the Sudanese Air Force as it was landing at a facility controlled by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF). The Sudanese Civil Aviation Authority also said on Wednesday that Emirati officials prevented a Sudanese airline from departing Abu Dhabi airport.
According to military sources cited by state media on August 6, the Sudanese Air Force bombed the runway of Nyala International Airport in South Darfur State. The sources said a UAE plane carrying Colombian mercenaries – set to fight alongside the RSF – was destroyed.
“The surprise attack targeted a group of Colombian mercenaries upon their arrival aboard a private plane believed to have taken off from one of the air bases in the Gulf. The air operation resulted in the deaths of dozens of mercenaries,” Sudan TV reported. It went on to say that the fighters were brought in to support the RSF in line with a “foreign plot” to destabilize the country and extend the war.
On Monday, the Port Sudan government accused Abu Dhabi of financially supporting Colombian mercenaries fighting alongside the RSF. The country’s Foreign Ministry said it had “irrefutable evidence” that “hundreds of thousands” of mercenaries from “certain” countries beyond Africa – who were involved in attacks against the Sudanese government – were being sponsored by the UAE.
“The Permanent Mission of Sudan to the United Nations in New York has previously submitted this evidence to the United Nations Security Council,” the Ministry said, warning that the “unprecedented phenomenon poses a serious threat to peace and security in the region and across the continent.” But the UAE “categorically” denied the claims and called them “false and unfounded.”
“The UAE affirms that these baseless allegations, entirely devoid of evidence, are nothing more than feeble media stunts aimed at diverting attention from the Port Sudan Authority’s direct responsibility for prolonging the civil war,” it added.
Sudan descended into war in mid-April 2023 when tensions between its military and rival paramilitary forces from the RSF erupted into violence in the capital, Khartoum, and spread to other regions. The conflict has killed tens of thousands and displaced millions. Earlier in 2025, the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) regained control of Khartoum. The UAE has long been accused of backing the RSF. A UN panel of experts has been investigating how mortar rounds exported from Bulgaria to the UAE in 2019 ended up in the hands of the RSF, according to documents reviewed by Reuters in April.
On May 6, Sudan’s Security and Defense Council severed all diplomatic relations with the UAE, recalled its embassy staff from Abu Dhabi, and declared the Gulf monarchy an “aggressor state.” This came after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) rejected a lawsuit filed by Sudan demanding that the UAE end activities contributing to the “genocide” against the Masalit ethnic group in the West Darfur region.
What We’re Reading
Sessions and divisions: In the last government session, the decision to task the army with disarming all non-state actors exposed deep political fractures and raised fears of further dividing Lebanese society. The analysis of Dana Hourany.
Between legitimacy and resistance: In recent weeks, the well-worn rhetoric of armed resistance has resurfaced once more. The usual voices of Hezbollah’s political front have returned to remind us of their supposed monopoly on national legitimacy, aggressively opposing any serious move toward disarmament. It’s a familiar discourse—recycled at every political crossroads—as if Lebanon can only be a state if it surrenders entirely to the rule of the gun. The opinion of Makram Rabah.
The cabinet meeting: Lebanon’s political landscape and society have long been divided with different views on Hezbollah’s role and the need for disarmament. The issue has dominated Lebanese politics for decades but now there is a sense of urgency with increasing international pressure, along with the increasing military pressure from Israel which regularly targets Hezbollah despite the ceasefire. The analysis of Rodayna Raydan.
The state that whispered while Hezbollah roared: The Lebanese cabinet recently convened a session hailed by some as “historic” — an opportunity to place the issue of Hezbollah’s weapons squarely on the table and affirm the monopoly of arms by the state. But in truth, there was nothing historic about the gathering. It was yet another hollow ritual in a broken political system, another chance wasted by a leadership that refuses to lead. Another opinion of Makram Rabah.
Disarmament is not treason: Hezbollah has suffered significant losses in recent months. The Israeli front has become a battleground of attrition, and whatever strategic value Hezbollah once claimed in the so-called “balance of deterrence” is visibly eroding. Moreover, as the regional calculus shifts, one thing changed immensely: Hezbollah’s weapons are no longer an Israeli issue. They are a deeply Lebanese issue. The comment of Ramzi Abou Ismail.
