Region

BEIRUT — Lebanon has decided to set up two camps for Syrian refugees for the first time along its border with war-torn Syria, Social Affairs Minister Rashid Derbas told AFP on Thursday.

The move comes despite long-standing reservations among many in Lebanon over establishing such camps, for fear they will encourage Syrians to stay in the country or threaten its security.

There are already more than 1.1 million Syrian refugees in Lebanon, which has a population of just 4 million people.

Many are already living in informal tented settlements on farmland or empty fields in parts of the country.

Derbas said the decision to establish the two camps had already been approved and that government representatives were meeting on Thursday to discuss implementing the plan.

"The Council of the Ministers has taken a decision to set up camps for Syrian refugees, one in the Bekaa Valley in the Masnaa area and one in the Abda area in northern Lebanon," Derbas said.

"Estimates are that each camp could accommodate 10,000 people," he added.

The refugee influx has put massive pressure on the country's limited resources and contributed to rising tensions in a nation with a delicate sectarian balance and bitter memories from a 15-year civil war.

The issue of refugee camps in Lebanon is particularly fraught because of its experience with the Palestinians who flooded into the country after the creation of Israel.

Those refugees and their children have remained in camps in the country, and armed Palestinian groups played a signficant and deadly role in the 1975-1990 Lebanese civil war.

The dispersal of Syrian refugees throughout the country has created its own pressures, and Derbas has several times advocated establishing camps.

He said Thursday's meeting of government representatives would set up a study on "implementation of the project of establishing camps" as well as a funding mechanism for the proposed sites.

The camps would have prefabricated homes for the refugees that "can be dismantled and taken with them when they move to Syria", he added.

In a statement, the UN refugee agency UNHCR said it was ready to cooperate with the project.

"In regard to the present proposal, we stand ready to work with the minister of social affairs on reviewing possible sites and assessing their feasibility as requested," it said.

But it warned that the "overriding imperative" in selecting a site should be security.

"This includes making sure sites are in areas that are not prone to floods or erosion so as to support structures needed to accommodate refugees," the statement said.

"It also means that the locations must not be vulnerable to being compromised by armed elements which can threaten refugees and their hosts."

The conflict in Syria has regularly spilled over into Lebanon, with the border region often particularly volatile.

The fighting has also stoked existing political and sectarian tensions in Lebanon, where many Sunnis back the uprising against President Bashar Al Assad and many Shiites support his regime.

GAZA CITY — Hamas's exiled deputy leader said on Thursday the group could be forced to negotiate directly with Israel, ahead of planned talks in Cairo to consolidate a truce.

But an Israeli minister dismissed any possibility of talking directly with the Islamist movement, whose charter calls for the destruction of Israel.

Hamas itself later reiterated its policy was not to talk with Israel.

Hamas does not recognise Israel, and Israel denounces Hamas as a "terrorist" organisation, and the two sides have never had any direct contact.

Following weeks of indirect, Egypt-brokered negotiations, Israel and Hamas agreed to halt their fire in Gaza on August 26 after 50 days of war, their deadliest confrontation in years.

The indirect talks are set to resume mid-September to discuss longer-term issues.

Asked if Hamas would contemplate negotiating directly with Israel, Mussa Abu Marzuq, the movement's exiled deputy leader, said it might be needed.

"If the situation remains as it is now... Hamas could find itself forced to do this," he told the Palestinian Al Quds TV, referring to the dire humanitarian situation and continued blockade on Gaza.

Under terms of the truce deal, Israel pledged an immediate easing of restrictions on goods and construction materials being shipped in to Gaza, but so far, officials say there has been little change on the ground.

"From a legal [Islamic] perspective there is nothing wrong with negotiating with the occupation," he said, indicating it could be necessary in order to guarantee the "rights" of the people of Gaza.

"Many of the issues that have been taboo within the movement could be up for discussion," he said of Hamas' historic refusal to negotiate with Israel.

But Israel's Science Minister Yaakov Peri dismissed outright any possibility of negotiating directly with Hamas.

"As long as Hamas doesn't abandon the path of violence and terrorism, recognise Israel and the Quartet conditions, Israel will not conduct direct talks with this terrorist organisation," Peri told public radio.

The conditions of the Middle East Quartet include recognising Israel, renouncing violence and respecting past agreements between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organisation.

"We will conduct indirect talks with Hamas through Egypt, but will do so in different rooms," Peri said, describing the way the Gaza truce talks were run over the past two months.

Hamas later reiterated that "talking with the Zionist enemy is not the policy of the movement".

"Nor has it been put forth for discussion," it said in a statement.

VIENNA — Iran and world powers have a "difficult road" ahead as they attempt to agree a nuclear deal by a November deadline, with major differences remaining, Tehran's lead negotiator said Thursday.

"We are always optimistic. But we have a difficult road to go," Abbas Araqchi told reporters after a day of talks in Vienna with officials from France, Germany and Britain.

He added after "useful" discussions that the differences between the two sides remain "big" as they attempt to nail down what would be an historic accord before November 24.

Britain, France and Germany form part of a six-nation group with the United States, Russia and China due to resume negotiations with Iran in New York on September 18.

Thursday's closed-door discussions in the Austrian capital followed bilateral US-Iranian discussions in Geneva last week described by Washington as an "in-depth exchange on the core issues".

The recent diplomatic flurry also saw Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif fly to Moscow, Brussels and Paris as well as Rome to meet Federica Mogherini, the incoming EU foreign policy chief from November 1.

The P5+1 powers, all of which except Germany sit on the UN Security Council and have nuclear weapons themselves, want Iran to scale back its atomic programme to ease fears the Islamic republic gets the bomb.

Tehran, which says its nuclear programme is exclusively for electricity generation and medical uses, in return wants painful UN and Western sanctions lifted.

On July 18, two days before a deadline to get a deal and after months of intense talks, Iran and the six powers decided to give themselves until November 24 to agree the accord.

The main problem issue remains the size of Iran's capacity to enrich uranium, a process that can make fuel for peaceful nuclear uses but also the core of an atomic bomb.

GAZA CITY — Hamas' exiled deputy leader said Wednesday that indirect talks with Israel to consolidate a Gaza ceasefire are to resume in Cairo in mid-September.

Fifty days of deadly fighting between Israel and Gaza fighters which killed more than 2,140 Palestinians and 73 on the Israeli side, ended on August 26 with an open-ended truce agreement.

Under terms of the deal, the parties agreed to resume Egyptian-brokered negotiations within a month to discuss key issues, including a Hamas demand for a port and an airport, a prisoner swap and Israel's insistence on Gaza fighters disarming.

Speaking to reporters in Gaza City during a visit from his base in Cairo, Musa Abu Marzouq said it was "expected that the talks would resume in mid-September”.

Israel agreed as part of the initial ceasefire to immediately ease restrictions on the entry of goods, humanitarian aid and construction materials into Gaza, and to expand the fishing zone off Gaza to six nautical miles.

All other issues would be delayed until the negotiators returned to Cairo, although there has been no official word on when that would happen.

“The Egyptians still have to give us the exact date,” Abu Marzouq said.

In a bid to pin down a date, Egyptian negotiators visited Jerusalem and Ramallah last week, a senior member of the Palestine Liberation Organisation told Voice of Palestine radio Wednesday.

“This was the aim of the Egyptian delegation’s visit to Ramallah and Israel. They spoke of resuming the negotiations in two weeks, between September 20-25,” said Bassem Al Salhi, who was part of the Palestinian team involved in truce talks.

A senior Egyptian official told AFP in Cairo that no date had been set for the negotiations to resume, but confirmed a “security delegation” had visited Ramallah, the West Bank political headquarters of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Abu Marzouq said the Palestinians were “determined to resume the talks” and that he expected the same from Israel.

There was no official comment from Israel on when the Cairo talks would resume.

Officials close to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have already dug their heels in, ruling out any chance of reopening Gaza’s battered port or airport.

And Palestinian officials have ruled out Israel’s demand for demilitarisation.

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — Israel on Wednesday dismantled a newly erected wooden access ramp to Jerusalem's Al Aqsa Mosque compound that would have increased access for non-Muslims but angered Jordan, an AFP correspondent said.

The half-built structure was erected by Israel in the midst of the Gaza conflict in early August, triggering outrage from Jordan which oversees Muslim heritage sites in Jerusalem.

It ran alongside a bigger wooden structure — the Mughrabi ramp — that leads from the Western Wall plaza up to Al Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem's Old City.

The Mughrabi ramp is the only access to the plaza for non-Muslims.

Anything that is viewed as changing the status quo in or around the flashpoint Al Aqsa compound, which houses the third-holiest site in Islam, is highly sensitive and triggers a strong response from Jordan.

Last week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered that the new structure be removed, saying its construction was "illegal" and had never received the proper authorisation, a government source said.

That move was hailed by Jordan and by Wednesday afternoon most of the new ramp had been taken down, the AFP correspondent said.

Jordan, the custodian of the Muslim holy places in Jerusalem, insists that since the ramp leads to the mosque compound, it should manage or at least be consulted over any new construction plans.

No coordination

Archaeologist Yonatan Mizrahi who runs Emek Shaveh, an Israeli NGO opposed to the "politicisation" of archaeology, said the structure was believed to be the beginning of a permanent ramp built "without coordination with the waqf or with Jordan."

Jordan's waqf is the religious body that oversees the compound and other Islamic sites in Jerusalem.

"We think it was the start of a new, permanent ramp," he told AFP.

The existing Mughrabi ramp, which is also wooden on a metal framework, was built in 2004 after its predecessor collapsed.

Negotiations between Israel, Jordan, Washington and other players over a permanent replacement began in 2007.

Although the sides came close to reaching a deal, the talks ultimately collapsed and the plans were never signed off, Mizrahi explained.

The ramp whose construction began in early August was located at the exact site where the permanent structure was to have stood, he said.

Amman’s authority over the Muslim holy sites in Jerusalem is anchored in the 1994 Israeli-Jordan peace treaty.

In 2011, the UN cultural agency (UNESCO) decided that all parties should be involved in the ramp’s design process and that neither side should take any unilateral actions that could affect the character of the site.

“Any unilateral move is perceived as a violation of the agreements between the two countries,” an Emek Shaveh paper said.

“As long as the Muslim Waqf feels that its position on Haram Al Sharif [the compound] is undermined, it would be difficult to present the construction of the ramp as an action that is not part of a specific political goal.”

Known to Muslims as Haram Al Sharif, the sprawling plaza at the southeastern edge of the Old City houses Muslim holy sites the Dome of the Rock and Al Aqsa Mosque.

The plaza is also considered the holiest place in Judaism as they believe the site was the location of the first and second Jewish Temples.

To one side of the plaza stands the Western Wall, currently the holiest site at which Jews can pray.

BEIRUT — Syria's Islamist Ahrar Al Sham rebel brigade named new chiefs on Wednesday after a devastating blast killed nearly 50 members of its leadership in a northwestern province largely under rebel control.

The blast in Idlib province on Tuesday evening killed the key rebel group's leader Hassan Abboud, known by the name Abu Abdullah Al Hamawi, along with 46 other top members.

The attack targeted a meeting of around 50 military and religious leaders in the basement of a house at Ram Hamdan, northeast of Idlib city.

The initial death toll in the attack was 28, but it rose to 47 on Wednesday morning, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

On Wednesday morning, in a video posted on YouTube, Ahrar Al Sham announced that Hashem Al Sheikh, known as Abu Jaber, would replace Abboud as head of the group, with Abu Saleh Tahhan as military commander.

"A group of the best chiefs of Ahrar Al Sham have been martyred. But Ahrar Al Sham is more determined than ever to continue on the path to liberating our country from dictators," the video statement said.

Ahrar Al Sham is a key component in the Islamic Front rebel coalition, which has been battling both President Bashar Assad's regime and jihadists of the Islamic State group.

No group has claimed the attack on Ahrar Al Sham's leadership and the rebel brigade has not officially pointed the finger at any organisation.

It was also unclear what caused the blast, whether a planted bomb, an attacker wearing explosives or even an air strike.

But the observatory said it believed the blast had been caused by a bomb planted in the entrance to an underground bunker where the leadership was meeting.

The blast blocked the only route out of the bunker and many of those killed died from asphyxiation, the Britain-based group's director Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP.

All of Idlib province is under rebel control apart from Idlib city. IS fighters were pushed out of the province earlier this year.

Elsewhere in Syria, the observatory said the toll in two regime air raids on the town of Douma in Damascus province on Tuesday rose to 25, including 10 children.

In Quneitra province, meanwhile, rebel forces continued to advance, with the observatory saying opposition forces were now in control of 70 per cent of the region.

Last week, rebel forces seized the Syrian side of the province's crossing with the Israeli-occupied portion of the Golan Heights plateau.

In eastern Deir Ezzor province, the observatory said Syrian warplanes continued aerial raids against the provincial capital.

Three jihadists from the Islamic State group were killed in the raids on Deir Ezzor city, along with nine civilians, three of them children, the group said.

Three other civilians were killed in an air raid elsewhere in the province, the Observatory added.

More than 180,000 people have been killed in Syria since an uprising against Assad's rule erupted in March 2011.

PARIS — France's foreign minister said Wednesday his country is ready to take part in airstrikes against extremist fighters in Iraq if needed.

Laurent Fabius called for international mobilisation against "this transnational danger that could reach all the way to our soil".

He spoke in Paris before President Barack Obama was expected to outline Washington's plans for fighting the Islamic State group in Syria and Iraq.

France has said it would join a US-led coalition in Iraq and is sending arms to Kurdish authorities to fight the militants. The French president and foreign minister are going to Iraq on Friday and hosting an international conference Monday on how to stop the group and help Iraq.

Fabius said in a speech in Paris that "we will participate, if necessary, in military air action" in Iraq, according to a text provided by the French foreign ministry.

Earlier, Fabius said people should stop referring to the extremists as the Islamic State group, arguing that they do not represent Islam or a state.

Fabius referred to the group Wednesday as Daesh, the acronym in Arabic for its full former name, Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.

SANAA — Shiite Houthi rebels clashed with Yemeni forces in a Sanaa suburb Wednesday as tensions ran high in the capital where they have set up protest camps, security sources and witnesses said.

A gunfight broke out in the Sabaha district, where Houthi protesters have been camping for weeks in a campaign to bring down the government and secure greater representation in state institutions.

On Tuesday, seven activists were shot dead as Houthi protesters attempted to storm government headquarters, while thousands blocked main thoroughfares in central Sanaa.

And troops in Hiziaz, a southern entrance to Sanaa, clashed with rebels who tried to drive a vehicle loaded with arms into the capital.

A civilian was killed and 15 others wounded in the confrontation, according to Yemen's top security commission, adding that several police and soldiers were also wounded.

It accused rebels of firing machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades.

The rebels have so far rejected overtures from President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, who has offered to name a new prime minister and reduced a disputed fuel price hike.

Both concessions were core demands of the Houthis who launched their protests on August 18, after battling loyalist forces for months for control of key cities north of Sanaa.

Analysts say the rebels are trying to establish themselves as the top political force in the northern highlands, bordering Saudi Arabia, where Shiites are the majority.

OCCUPIED JERUSALEM — The European Union warned Wednesday that violence could re-ignite in Gaza within "months" if Israel and Hamas fail to consolidate a fragile ceasefire through serious talks.

The EU ambassador to Israel, Lars Faaborg-Andersen, and John Gatt-Rutter, envoy to the West Bank and Gaza, spoke to journalists in Jerusalem just two weeks after a bloody and destructive conflict in the tiny coastal territory that killed more than 2,100 Palestinians and 73 people on the Israeli side.

"The destruction in Gaza has been devastating and we feel that if the situation goes unaddressed, there is still a considerable potential for violence," Faaborg-Andersen warned, saying this could come "in a matter of months".

The EU has pushed for indirect talks to resume between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas which controls Gaza after the initial ceasefire was agreed on August 26.

"Hopefully it will be possible still to get the negotiations up and running very quickly," he said.

Hamas' exiled deputy leader said Wednesday that talks were to resume mid-September in Cairo.

Under terms of the truce, the parties agreed to resume Egyptian-brokered negotiations within a month to discuss key issues, including a Hamas demand for a port and an airport, a prisoner swap and Israel's insistence on Gaza fighters disarming.

Israel agreed as part of the initial ceasefire to immediately ease restrictions on the entry of goods, humanitarian aid and construction materials into Gaza, and to expand the fishing zone off Gaza to six nautical miles.

But Hamas has already indicated it intends to rearm, and Israel has said it will reject the port and airport demand.

Gatt-Rutter said the provision of EU aid would depend on how much progress is made in any negotiations.

"A number of conditions need to be met before we start to think about identifying the kind of funds that can actually have a real impact on the reconstruction" of Gaza, huge residential swathes of which were destroyed by Israeli bombardment, he said.

"It's essential that we use the next four weeks to actually come to... understandings... that would allow us as the European Union to work together with our partners in identifying the kind of funds that can make a difference."

The remarks came a month ahead of a donor conference on Gaza, and after the UN and the Palestinian government called for $551 million (427 million euros) in aid to help hundreds of thousands of Gazans affected by the conflict's aftermath.

RAMALLAH — The United Nations and the Palestinian government called Tuesday for international donors to provide $550 million in aid to help hundreds of thousands of Gazans affected by a devastating war with Israel.

The appeal comes two weeks after Israel and Hamas ended 50 days of bloodshed that killed more than 2,100 people, mostly civilians, and a month ahead of a donors’ conference in Cairo.

“The scope of damage and devastation is unprecedented in the Gaza Strip,” James Rawley, the UN’s humanitarian coordinator for the Palestinian territories, said in a statement.

“The crisis is far from over.”

Rawley and Palestinian Deputy Prime Minister Mohammed Mustafa outlined the humanitarian needs for post-war Gaza, calling for $551 million (427 million euros) for food aid, access to clean water, healthcare and education.

“We challenge the world to be ambitious and daring in helping us realise recovery, reconstruction and a better future for Gaza,” Mustafa said.

“An immediate measure is to end the blockade on Gaza and ensure our people never again experience the horrors of this summer,” he said.

Rawley echoed calls for a “full lifting of the blockade”.

Israel agreed to ease restrictions on goods entering Gaza under a truce deal reached with Hamas on August 26.

But restrictions remain on building materials, which are crucial for reconstructing the strip, large residential parts of which were flattened by Israeli artillery and aerial bombardment during the conflict.

Israel says steel and concrete could be used by Gaza fighters to make weapons and build tunnels for attacking Israel.

Of the three crossings into the tiny coastal enclave, Israel controls two — one for personnel movement and another for goods. Egypt controls the third.

Tight restrictions of people movement are enforced, with only some in the strip allowed to enter and exit, mostly for humanitarian reasons such as emergency medical care.

The UN has predicted that more than 100,000 people are to remain homeless in the long term.

Israel launched its Gaza offensive on July 8, ostensibly in response to rocket fire from Hamas and other Gaza-based groups.

More than 2,100 Palestinians were killed, of which 70 per cent were civilians, according to the UN.

Israel says it killed nearly 1,000 fighters.

On the Israeli side, 67 soldiers and six civilians were killed. Most rockets fired into Israel were intercepted or struck open ground.