Region

BEIRUT, Lebanon — After searching for years for his son and brothers following their arrest and disappearance by Bashar Assad's forces, Syrian real estate broker Maher Al Ton hopes he may finally get justice under the new authorities.

Last week, the government announced the creation of a national commission for missing persons and another for transitional justice.

That, along with the new rulers' arrests of alleged human rights violators linked to the ousted president's government, have made Ton feel hopeful.

"I feel like my son might still be alive," the 54-year-old said.

Assad's forces arrested Ton's son Mohammed Nureddin in 2018 near Damascus when he was just 17 years old, and has not been heard from since.

"I hope justice and fairness will prevail, and that they will reclaim our rights from the Syrian Arab Army which unjustly took our sons," he said, using the since disbanded military's official name.

Rights groups have welcomed the establishment of the justice commissions, but criticised the limiting of their scope to crimes committed by Assad's government.

Syria's war erupted in 2011 with a brutal government crackdown on democracy protesters that saw tens of thousands of people accused of dissent either jailed or killed.

Over time, armed groups emerged to battle Assad's military, including jihadist forces that committed atrocities.

During the war, rights groups accused the Hayat TahrirAl Sham (HTS) group, once affiliated with Al Qaeda, of abuses including unlawful detention and torture.

HTS spearheaded the offensive that ousted Assad in December, and its leaders now form the core of the new government.

DiabSerriya, a co-founder of the Association of Detainees and Missing Persons of Saydnaya Prison, said that while Assad's government was "the biggest perpetrator of human rights violations", that does not "absolve the other parties in the conflict".

The new body, he said, "does not meet the aspirations of victims".

 'Criminals' 

Syria's new rulers have also arrested several former military and security officials accused of crimes.

This month, the interior ministry announced the arrest of Ghassan Youssef Ali, a doctor, saying he was "one of the officers working at the Tishreen Military Hospital during the era of the former regime".

AFP published in January a report about how detainees were beaten instead of treated at that hospital, the largest military health facility in Damascus.

In April, the security forces detained former intelligence officer Sultan al-Tinawi on accusations of war crimes.

According to Rami Abdel Rahman, head of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor, "fewer than 10" high-ranking officials have been arrested, with most fleeing the country in the wake of Assad's fall.

Others have gone into hiding in areas of the country that are home to a large Alawite community, whose members stem from the same religious minority as Assad.

Mohammad Al Abdallah, executive director of the Syria Justice and Accountability Centre, said that "there are random arrests of individuals without a plan to search for the missing or to open central investigations into the crime of enforced disappearance, or even to protect mass graves".

Justice is 'essential' 

HibaZayadin, senior researcher at Human Rights Watch, agreed.

"There isn't much transparency around what is taking place following these arrests," she said.

Abdallah said there appeared to be "two tendencies: to arrest some individuals, most of them lower-ranking, and to cooperate with other individuals".

Among those who evaded arrest, he said, was FadiSaqr, a former commander in the National Defence Forces, a pro-Assad militia.

Instead, he has joined a committee in the coastal province of Latakia tasked with building bridges between communities divided by years of violence and sectarian conflict.

Transitional justice processes in other parts of the world have been long and painful -- with some countries involving alleged abusers in their new systems to ensure a degree of continuity, and others choosing to turn over a new leaf.

In a report last week, Amnesty International said it was "essential" that those responsible for crimes against humanity, war crimes and torture face justice in fair trials.

"Delaying justice will only heighten the risk of further bloodshed," it added.

DUBAI — Rights group Amnesty International urged the United States on Monday to investigate possible violations of international law in a deadly strike on a migrant detention facility in rebel-held Yemen.

Last month's attack, which prompted international alarm and was part of the US bombardment campaign against the Iran-backed Huthis, killed 68 people held at a centre for irregular migrants in Saada, the rebel authorities said at the time.

Agnes Callamard, Amnesty's secretary-general, said that "the US attacked a well-known detention facility where the Huthis have been detaining migrants."

The dead were all migrants from African countries, the Huthis had said.

To Callamard, "the major loss of civilian life in this attack raises serious concerns about whether the US complied with its obligations under international humanitarian law."

"The US must conduct a prompt, independent and transparent investigation into this air strike," she added.

A US defence official had told AFP in the aftermath of the strike that the military launched "battle-damage assessment and inquiry" into "claims of civilian casualties related to the US strikes in Yemen".

Amnesty cited people who work with migrants and refugees in Yemen and visited two hospitals that treated the victims, saying that they had seen "more than two dozen Ethiopian migrants" with severe injuries including amputations.

The morgues at both hospitals had run out of space, the witnesses told Amnesty.

In mid-March, the United States began an intense, near-daily military campaign against the Huthis after they had renewed threats to attack vessels in the vital Red Sea and Gulf of Aden shipping lanes.

The campaign ended with a US-Huthi ceasefire agreement earlier this month.

The Huthis, who control large swathes of Yemen, began firing on Israel and Israeli-linked shipping in November 2023, weeks into the Gaza war triggered by an attack by the Yemeni rebels' Palestinian ally Hamas.

Amnesty said it had analysed satellite imagery and footage from the site of last month's strike on Saada, in Yemen's north.

The group said it was "unable to conclusively identify a legitimate military target" within the targeted prison compound, citing Huthi restrictions on independent investigations.

"Any attack that fails to distinguish between civilians and civilian objects on the one hand, and legitimate military targets on the other, even within the same compound, constitutes an indiscriminate attack and a violation of international humanitarian law," Amnesty said.

GAZA CITY, Palestinian Territories — Israel said Monday it will "take control" of the whole of Gaza, where rescuers reported more than 50 killed in Israeli strikes as the military pressed a newly intensified campaign.

After more than two months of a total blockade, the World Health Organisation issued a stark warning on the humanitarian crisis in the besieged Gaza Strip, saying "two million people are starving".

Under mounting pressure to lift the blockade it imposed on Gaza on March 2, Israel has announced it would let limited aid into the besieged territory and said a first delivery of "trucks with baby food" would enter Monday.

Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu cited "practical and diplomatic reasons" for the resumption, while the UN humanitarian agency OCHA said it had been approached by Israeli authorities about the resumption of aid.

In southern Gaza, the Israeli military issued an evacuation call to Palestinians in and around Khan Yunis city ahead of what it described as an "unprecedented attack".

The call came after the military announced it had begun "extensive ground operations" in an expanded offensive against Hamas militants, whose October 7, 2023 attack on Israel triggered the war.

Gaza's civil defence agency said 52 people had been killed in Israeli attacks on Monday across the territory.

Netanyahu, in a video posted on Telegram, said that "the fighting is intense and we are making progress."

"We will take control of all the territory of the strip," the Israeli leader added.

The UN's OHCHR rights office decried actions that are "in defiance of international law and tantamount to ethnic cleansing", citing the latest attacks, displacement, the "methodical destruction of entire neighbourhoods" and denial of humanitarian aid.

Netanyahu on Monday said that Israel "will not give up. But in order to succeed, we must act in a way that cannot be stopped", justifying to his hardline supporters the decision to resume aid.

"We must not let the population [of Gaza] sink into famine, both for practical and diplomatic reasons," Netanyahu said, adding that even supporters of Israel would not tolerate "images of mass starvation".

Famine risk 

Israel said its blockade was aimed at forcing concessions from Hamas, while UN agencies have warned of critical shortages of food, clean water, fuel and medicines.

"Tonnes of food is blocked at the border, just minutes away", World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesussaid.

"The risk of famine in Gaza is increasing with the deliberate withholding of humanitarian aid."

The Israeli foreign ministry said that "trucks with baby food" would enter Gaza on Monday, and that "in the coming days, Israel will facilitate the entry of dozens of aid trucks".

Last week US President Donald Trump acknowledged that "a lot of people are starving", adding "we're going to get that taken care of".

Israel's far-right national security minister Itamar Ben Gvirargued against any resumption of aid, saying on X that "our hostages receive no humanitarian aid".

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, also of the far right, defended the decision, stressing no supplies would be allowed to reach Hamas.

"This will allow civilians to eat and our friends in the world to keep giving us diplomatic protection," he said.

Israel's military said on Monday it had struck "160 terror targets" in Gaza over the past day.

Military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani said troops aim to "encircle" some areas, "get the civilian population out of the way, and then fight Hamas".

'Like apocalypse' 

Khan Yunis resident Mohammed Sarhan told AFP that Gaza's main southern city "felt like the apocalypse" on Monday.

"There was gunfire coming from every apartment, fire belts, F-16 warplanes and helicopters firing," he said.

Israeli military spokesman Avichay Adraee earlier called on Gazans in the city and nearby areas to "evacuate immediately".

"From this moment, Khan Yunis will be considered a dangerous combat zone," he said on social media.

AFPTV footage showed a helicopter over the city, while at Nasser Hospital, a young boy in a tracksuit was being treated as two other boys, both barefoot and bleeding, sat on the floor.

Further north in Deir El Balah, Ayman Badwan mourned the loss of his brother in an attack.

"We are exhausted and drained -- we can't take it anymore," he told AFP.

Gaza's health ministry said Monday at least 3,340 people have been killed since Israel resumed strikes on March 18, taking the war's overall toll to 53,486.

GAZA CITY, Palestinian Territories — Israel signalledSunday that it was open to striking a deal with Hamas that included "ending the fighting" in Gaza, where rescuers reported dozens killed a day after Israel stepped up its offensive.

Israel's military has said the expansion of its campaign is aimed at "achieving all the war's objectives" including releasing hostages and "the defeat of Hamas".

But as the intensified operations got underway, Israel and Hamas were entering indirect talks in Qatar that the Palestinian group said were aimed at ending the war.

In a statement on Sunday, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said that "even at this very moment, the negotiation team in Doha is working to exhaust every possibility for a deal -- whether according to the Witkoff framework or as part of ending the fighting," referring to US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoffwho has been involved in previous discussions.

Such a deal, according to Netanyahu's statement, "would include the release of all the hostages, the exile of Hamas terrorists, and the disarmament of the Gaza Strip".

Ever since a two-month ceasefire fell apart in March as Israel resumed its offensive, negotiations mediated by Qatar, Egypt and the United States have failed to reach a breakthrough.

Netanyahu has opposed ending the war without Hamas's total defeat, while Hamas has balked at the prospect of handing over its weapons.

Senior Hamas official Taher Al Nunu said on Saturday that the talks in Doha had kicked off "without any preconditions from either side".

A Hamas source familiar with the negotiations said that "positions are being exchanged by both sides in an attempt at bridging perspectives", adding the group was approaching the talks with "great flexibility".

'No one left' 

On the ground, civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP on Sunday that 22 people were killed and at least 100 others wounded in a predawn attack on tents sheltering displaced Palestinians in Al-Mawasi, in the southern Gaza Strip.

AFPTV footage showed people sifting through the wreckage of ruined shelters and rescuers treating the wounded.

At a hospital in nearby Khan Yunis city, young men mourned over the shrouded bodies of loved ones laid out on the ground outside.

"All my family members are gone. There is no one left," said a distraught Warda al-Shaer standing amid the wreckage in Al Mawasi.

"The children were killed as well as their parents. My mother died too, and my niece lost her eye."

Bassal said that the "series of violent Israeli air strikes" across Gaza overnight and in the early morning resulted in a total of "at least 33 martyrs, more than half of whom were children".

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military.

Israel's intensified assault comes as international concern has mounted over worsening humanitarian conditions in Gaza due to a blockade on aid imposed on March 2.

UN chief Antonio Guterres, addressing an Arab League Summit in Baghdad on Saturday, said he was "alarmed" at the escalation and called for "a permanent ceasefire, now".

The summit's final statement urged the international community "to exert pressure to end the bloodshed".

Hospitals 'out of service' 

In Tel Aviv, demonstrators took to the streets on Saturday to protest against Netanyahu's government and demand it strike a deal to secure the release of the remaining hostages.

"Instead of bringing them all home by agreeing to the deal that is on the table, Netanyahu is dragging us into a needless political war that will lead to the death of the hostages and soldiers," said protester Zahiro Shahar Mor, nephew of slain hostage AvrahamMunder.

Of the 251 hostages taken during Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack that triggered the war, 57 remain in Gaza, including 34 the military says are dead.

Israel has faced increasing pressure to lift its aid blockade, as UN agencies warn of critical shortages of food, clean water, fuel and medicine.

On Sunday, the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza accused Israel of laying siege to the Indonesian Hospital in Beit Lahia, where it said "a state of panic and confusion is prevailing".

The ministry later said Israel had cut off the arrival of patients and staff, "effectively forcing the hospital out of service".

With "the shutdown of the Indonesian Hospital, all public hospitals in the North Gaza Governorate are now out of service", it said.

The Gaza health ministry said that at least 3,193 people have been killed since Israel resumed strikes on March 18, taking the war's overall toll to 53,339.

TRIPOLI — Flights resumed on Friday at Tripoli airport as businesses and markets reopened after days of deadly fighting between armed groups in the Libyan capital.

"Last night, for the first time since Monday, residents of the capital were able to sleep without hearing explosions or gunfire," an interior ministry official told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.

After the bout of violence that pitted armed groups aligned with the Tripoli government and rival factions it seeks to dismantle, the official said: "We believe the situation is moving toward a ceasefire."

Security forces were out in force for an anti-government demonstration joined by around 1,000 people from various parts of the capital, AFP journalists reported.

But there were no immediate reports of any disturbances.

Ahead of the demonstration, the UN Support Mission in Libya, UNSMIL, had underlined "citizens' right to peaceful protest" and warned against "any escalation of violence".

Authorities have deployed teams to clear the streets of barricades, burned-out vehicles and rubble caused by the violence, the latest outburst in Libya which has remained deeply divided since the 2011 revolt that toppled and killed longtime leader Muamer Qadhafi.

The country is split between a UN-recognised government in Tripoli, led by Prime Minister Abdulhamid Dbeibah, and a rival administration in the east controlled by the family of military strongman Khalifa Haftar.

The violence in Tripoli was sparked by the killing of Abdelghani al-Kikli, head of the Support and Stability Apparatus (SSA) faction, by the Dbeibah-aligned 444 Brigade.

A second wave of clashes pitted the 444 Brigade against another group, the Radaa force, which controls parts of eastern Tripoli and several key state institutions.

A string of executive orders had sought to dismantle Radaa and dissolve other Tripoli-based armed groups, excluding the 444 Brigade.

UNSMIL said on Thursday there was a "truce" in Tripoli, calling on "parties to take urgent steps to sustain and build upon it through dialogue".

It said that "at least eight civilians" were killed in the clashes, "which drew armed groups from outside the city and subjected heavily populated neighbourhoods to heavy artillery fire".

The interior ministry source said authorities were patrolling key parts in Tripoli, as "armed groups' vehicles" withdrew from flashpoint areas.

"It's a positive thing, and it indicates good intentions," said the source.

Human rights group Amnesty International demanded that "militia leaders (be) held to account after the outbreak of violence in Tripoli".

It said for years, groups including the SSA "terrorised people in Tripoli through enforced disappearances, torture, and other crimes under international law".

The International Criminal Court announced on Thursday that Libya had recognised its jurisdiction over allegations of war crimes committed in the North African country since 2011.