Region

DOHA — Nine Arab countries will meet in Saudi Arabia later this week to discuss moves to end the decade-old isolation of President Bashar Assad, diplomats said Tuesday.

Qatar's foreign ministry said a meeting would be held on Friday in Jeddah to discuss Syria while other diplomats confirmed that the Assad government's potential presence at an Arab League summit next month would be on the table.

Ministers and top officials from the six Gulf Cooperation Council countries, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, and Egypt, Iraq and Jordan have been invited, Qatar foreign ministry spokesperson Majed Al Ansari said.

Pressure has been mounting in recent months for greater engagement with Assad, who has been isolated since the start of the Syrian war in 2011.

Assad has visited the UAE and Oman this year and last month Saudi Arabia said it has started talks with Damascus about resuming consular services.

The Arab League, which excluded Syria in 2011 over the violent crackdown on regime opponents, is expected to hold a summit in Riyadh in May. 

The main objective of Friday’s meeting “is to discuss the situation in Syria”, Ansari told a briefing, adding that Qatar would be represented by Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed Bin Abdulrahman Al Thani.

An Arab diplomat in the Gulf confirmed that Syria would be the focus of the Jeddah meeting and that “the Arab summit and Syria’s participation in it will definitely be on the table”.

Ansari said Saudi Arabia had called the “consultative meeting” through the GCC secretariat. Iraq, Jordan and Egypt had been invited as they are “concerned countries”.

The GCC did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Among the countries invited, the Iraqi government said it was considering the invitation. 

“There are many developments regarding the situation in Syria and Arab views towards Syria’s return to the Arab League,” the Qatari official said.

Talks “will focus on exchanging views on this issue and the standing of each country on the situation” in Syria, he added.

TEHRAN — Iran's parliament has adopted proposals to toughen penalties for perpetrators of violence against women which could be voted into law within months, state media has reported.

Initiated more than 10 years ago, discussions in parliament led to the adoption on Sunday of the general principles of a draft bill called "preventing harm to women and improving their safety against misbehaviour", IRNA news agency reported.

The text, which can still be modified, could be formally promulgated into law in the coming months.

The move comes almost seven months after the start of a nationwide protest movement sparked by the September 16 death in custody of Mahsa Amini. The 22-year-old Iranian of Kurdish ethnicity had been arrested for allegedly flouting the country's strict dress code for women.

In recent years, human rights defenders have urged Iranian authorities to reform the law on the protection of women and to toughen penalties for domestic violence.

According to the text agreed upon on Sunday, courts could sentence to up to 15 years in jail a man convicted of murdering his wife if the victim’s family rejects the sentence of qesas (Iran’s Islamic law of retribution) — five years more than the current maximum sentence.

The publication of pornographic images without a woman’s consent and forcing a woman to marry against her will would also be considered a crime, according to the text.

It also allows the judiciary to provide married women with a permit to leave the country even if their husband prevents them from travelling abroad.

The debate over this issue arose in 2015 when the husband of the captain of the women’s national football team prevented her from taking part in the Asian Cup.

Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has the final say in major state policies, had in January called for a tougher law to protect women.

“In our society, women are oppressed in some families,” Khamenei said at the time, adding: “If the law does not protect a woman, a man may abuse her.”

“The solution is for the laws related to the family to be so strong that no man can oppress women,” the supreme leader said.

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — Israel launched artillery strikes on Syria Sunday morning, the Israeli forces announced, after several rockets were fired from there and landed in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

Israel's retaliatory strike to rocket attacks from Syria, which no one has claimed, is the latest episode in escalating violence in the region.

Six rockets were launched towards Israel Saturday night, with two landing in the Golan Heights, the Israeli forces said. At least one was intercepted by the Israeli air-defence system.

The 1,200 square kilometre region, patrolled by Israeli soldiers and bordering Lebanon, was seized from Syria in the June War of 1967. Israel later occupied it in a move that was never recognised by the international community.

Syrian state news agency SANA said the Israeli strikes took place around 5:00 am (0200 GMT).

Citing an unnamed military source, SANA said Syria’s military had “intercepted the rockets... and brought down some of them”.

The surge in violence and unrest comes as the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan Jewish Passover and Christian Easter coincide.

On Wednesday, Israeli troops stormed the prayer hall of Al Aqsa Mosque, Islam’s third-holiest site, in a pre-dawn raid aimed at dislodging “law-breaking youths masked agitators” they said had barricaded themselves inside.

The next day, more than 30 rockets were fired from Lebanese soil into Israel, which the Israeli forces blamed on Palestinian groups, saying it was most likely Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip.

Israel then bombarded Gaza and southern Lebanon, targeting “terror infrastructures” that it said belonged to Hamas.

It was the biggest salvo fired from Lebanon since Israel fought a devastating 34-day war with Iran-backed militant group Hizbollah in 2006 and the first time Israel has confirmed an attack on Lebanese territory since April 2022.

Israel and Lebanon are technically in a state of war, and the ceasefire line is patrolled by the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon, deployed in the country’s south.

On the Syrian side, Israel has recently intensified its raids targeting positions of pro-Iranian groups.

Violence in Israel 

On Friday evening, an Italian tourist was killed and seven other people injured in a suspected car-ramming attack on pedestrians on the Tel Aviv seafront.

In response, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu instructed the forces to “mobilise all reserve border police units”.

He also directed the army to “mobilise additional forces”, his office said.

Earlier on Friday, two British-Israeli sisters aged 16 and 20 were killed and their mother seriously wounded when their car was fired on in the Jordan Valley in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

Police said four reserve battalions of border police would be deployed in city centres from Sunday.

The defence ministry confirmed late Saturday it had mobilised soldiers to support the police, and that it would tighten entry restrictions into Israel for Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza, in particular workers.

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — Thousands of worshippers held tense celebrations in Jerusalem Sunday, as Christian Easter coincided with Jewish Passover and the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, amid a surge in violence in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Leading Easter Mass at the Vatican, Pope Francis expressed "deep concern" Sunday over the flare-up in tensions sparked by an Israeli police raid on Al Aqsa Mosque days ago.

Israel has since struck targets in Gaza, Lebanon and most recently Syria in response to rocket fire mostly blamed on Palestinian fighters, while separate attacks in the West Bank and Tel Aviv killed three people including an Italian tourist.

On Sunday pilgrims crowded into the narrow alleyways of Jerusalem's Old City, flanked by heavily-armed Israeli security forces deployed following the recent deadly attacks.

Churchgoers were ushered through the courtyard of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, built on the site where Christians believe Jesus was crucified, buried and resurrected.

"[I had] some doubt, taking into consideration recent events, but still I decided to go," said 50-year-old Paulius Majauskas, visiting from Lithuania.

Near the church, thousands of Jewish pilgrims gathered at the Western Wall for the traditional priestly blessing of Passover.

Judy Green, 60, said the blessing was "beautiful, very uplifting" at the Western Wall, the holiest place where Jews can pray.

"I feel that God will protect us, we're all praying together as one people," she said.

Muslims fear Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's hard-right government may change longstanding rules that allow Jews to visit but not pray at Al Aqsa Compound, despite his repeated denials.

In recent years, the number of Jews visiting the esplanade has increased and ultranationalists sometimes pray there surreptitiously in breach of the rules.

Israeli forces stormed the prayer hall of the mosque in a violent pre-dawn raid Wednesday they said was aimed at dislodging "law-breaking youths and masked agitators".

Mahmud Mansour, a Palestinian Muslim, criticised the police actions.

“This is our place, we have to stay in the evening, in the night and this is Ramadan, we have to pray,” the 65-year-old told AFP near the mosque compound.

The raid followed reports that Jewish activists were intending to hold a traditional Passover sacrifice at the compound, a process which is banned and which a top Israeli rabbi has moved to prevent.

The day after the raid, rockets were fired from Lebanon into Israel, which the Israeli forces blamed on Palestinian groups.

Israel then bombarded Gaza and southern Lebanon.

The Israeli forces also said it launched strikes on Syria Sunday morning, after rockets fired from there landed in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

Israel has launched hundreds of air strikes during more than a decade of civil war in Syria, primarily targeting Iran-backed forces and Lebanese Hizbollah fighters, as well as Syrian army positions.

Israelis were also set to gather Sunday for the funeral of two sisters killed when their car came under fire in the occupied West Bank on Friday.

The mother of the two British-Israeli sisters, aged 16 and 20, was seriously wounded in the attack.

Their family urged “religious, secular, ultra-Orthodox, people of right and left” to pray tribute to the victims during the funeral, which will be held in the West Bank settlement where they lived.

Settlements in the occupied territories are considered illegal under international law, a charge Israel disputes.

Hours after the fatal shooting on Friday, an Italian tourist was killed and seven other people wounded in a suspected car-ramming attack in Tel Aviv.

On Saturday, Israeli troops shot dead a Palestinian man in the West Bank. The army said soldiers shot at suspects who threw an “explosive device” towards them, while the Palestinian health ministry said the 20-year-old suffered bullets wounds to the chest and abdomen.

This year the conflict has claimed the lives of at least 92 Palestinians, 18 Israelis, one Ukrainian and one Italian, according to an AFP count based on Israeli and Palestinian official sources.

RIYADH — A Saudi Arabian diplomatic delegation arrived on Saturday in Tehran to discuss the reopening of its diplomatic missions after a seven-year absence, Riyadh's foreign ministry said.

The visit follows an unprecedented meeting between the foreign ministers of both countries in China this week after they agreed last month to restore diplomatic ties.

Saturday's visit is part of "implementing the tripartite agreement" reached on March 10 between the two regional powers, brokered by China, to restore relations ruptured in 2016, the Saudi foreign ministry said, cited by the official Saudi Press Agency.

The two longtime Middle East rivals have now pledged to work together.

Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal Bin Farhan and his Iranian counterpart Hossein Amir-Abdollahian met in Beijing on Thursday and vowed to bring "security and stability" to the turbulent Gulf region.

On Saturday, a Saudi "technical delegation" met Iran's chief of protocol at the foreign ministry in Tehran, SPA said.

The two countries severed ties after protesters in the Islamic republic attacked Saudi diplomatic missions following Riyadh's execution of a prominent Shiite cleric.

Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi has been invited by Saudi King Salman to Riyadh, a trip planned to take place after the holy fasting month of Ramadan.

BAGHDAD — Iraqi President Abdel Latif Rashid condemned Turkey on Saturday for bombarding an area near Sulaimaniyah airport in the autonomous Kurdish region, a flashpoint between the two governments.

"Turkish military operations against the Kurdistan region continue to take place, the last being the bombardment [Friday] against Sulaimaniyah civilian airport," Rashid said in a statement.

Rashid, who is himself a Kurd from Sulaimaniyah, said such actions by Turkish forces have "no legal justification" and serve only to "terrorise civilians under the pretext that hostile forces are present in Iraq".

He was referring to the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) which has a presence in Iraq's Kurdistan region and is blacklisted as a "terrorist" organisation by Turkey and its allies.

Contacted by AFP, a source at the Turkish defence ministry denied any involvement in Friday's bombardment saying "Turkish armed forces undertook no such activity".

The afternoon bombardment caused a small fire near the airport which was quickly brought under control, a statement from airport security said.

Turkey has repeatedly sought to remove the rebel PKK group in air and ground operations using drones to target them.

On Monday, Ankara halted flights to and from Sulaimaniyah until at least July 3, blaming increased PKK activity in and around the airport.

The Turkish foreign ministry said at the time that PKK activities were posing a "threat" to air security.

In early March, a Turkish drone strike in northern Iraq killed two Yazidi fighters affiliated with the PKK, days after a similar strike killed three other fighters.

The PKK has waged an insurgency in Turkey that has claimed tens of thousands of lives since 1984.

Turkey has also carried several incursions into neighbouring Syria to push back Kurdish-led fighters of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which Ankara considers to be an extension of the PKK.

On Saturday, SDF leader Mazloum Abdi denounced the bombardment against Sulaimaniyah airport, saying it was a sign of Turkish irritation at the support given to the SDF by the province's dominant faction, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK).

Turkey regards the SDF and its main component, the People's Protection Units (YPG), as an offshoot of the PKK, even though the force is backed by the United States as the mainstay of its campaign against the Daesh terrror group in Syria.

TUNIS — Twenty migrants from sub-Saharan Africa were missing after their boat sank off Tunisia's coast in an attempt to reach Europe, a spokesman for the court that investigates such cases said Saturday.

They were among 37 people aboard the vessel which had left from Tunisia's coast and then "sank on Friday afternoon", Faouzi Masmoudi, the court spokesman in Sfax city, told AFP, adding that 17 people were rescued.

It was at least the sixth sinking since the beginning of March, according to an AFP tally, in incidents which have left around 100 people dead or missing.

The latest case adds to the more than 14,000 migrants which Tunisia’s coast guard said it has intercepted on their way to Europe between January and March.

That is more than five times the number from the first quarter of 2022.

Tunisia’s shores lie only about 150 kilometres from the Italian island of Lampedusa.