Region

By Guillaume Lavallee
Agence France-Presse

BEITA, Palestinian Territories — Using laser pointers and noisy horns to torment Jewish settlers across the valley, Palestinians in Beita have set themselves apart from others demonstrating against Israel’s occupation of the West Bank.

But beyond attention-grabbing tactics, protesters in the Palestinian town near Nablus insist their weeks-long campaign against the wildcat settlement of Eviatar is distinct for another reason.

They describe it as a grassroots movement, not inspired or directed by Fateh secularists who control the Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank, or their rivals from the Islamist Hamas that runs the Gaza Strip.

“Here there is only one flag: That of Palestine. There are no factions,” Said Hamayel told AFP.

“We are doing from below what Palestinian leaders cannot do from above,” argued Hamayel, who said his 15-year-old son Mohammed was killed by Israeli forces gunfire in a mid-June protest.

Israeli forces said it had opened fire to suppress “rioters” who posed a grave threat to troops.

The Beita protests broke out in May as a group of hard-line settlers erected a Jewish community on a nearby hilltop.

All settlements are considered illegal under international law, but Israel has granted authorisation to such communities across the West Bank, a territory it has occupied since 1967.

But Eviatar was built without Israeli approval and the government struck a deal with settlers for their evacuation on July 2, while it studied the land to evaluate the prospect of eventual authorisation.

‘Popular resistance’ 

Israeli forces stationed at Eviatar since the settlers left have faced ongoing protests from the people of Beita, who number about 12,500 and say the surrounding land belongs to them.

More than 700 Palestinians have been injured and at least seven have been killed since the unrest erupted in May, according to the Palestinian health ministry.

Hamayel, who is still grieving over the loss of his son, voiced pride in what he termed the Beita “model”.

“The Israelis want to stamp out our new form of popular resistance. They are afraid of it.”

He said the Beita movement stood in contrast to the PA, led by 86-year-old president Mahmud Abbas, which “does nothing but issue statements” denouncing Israel’s occupation.

Palestinian politics have been fractured since 2007, the year Hamas took over Gaza after Fateh refused to recognise the Islamists’ election win.

Despite various reconciliation bids, bitter acrimony between the factions persists.

Fateh has remained entrenched in the West Bank, with Hamas running Gaza, but experts said events earlier this year altered sentiments among ordinary Palestinians.

Abbas cancelled the first scheduled Palestinian elections in 15 years, as street rallies in support of Palestinians facing Israeli eviction in occupied East Jerusalem gained momentum.

With tensions building in the Holy City and elsewhere, Israeli forces clashed with Palestinians at Jerusalem’s Al Aqsa Mosque compound, Islam’s third holiest site.

On May 10, Hamas fired rockets at Jerusalem, citing its mandate to defend Al Aqsa.

An 11-day Israel-Gaza conflict followed the Jerusalem rocket attack, with Hamas and other armed groups in the enclave launching thousands of munitions at Israel, which hit Gaza with hundreds of air strikes.

Common cause 

The conflict and East Jerusalem protests revived a sense of common cause for young Palestinians that transcends allegiance to either Fatah or Hamas, said Jalaa Abu Arab, the 27-year-old editor of the Palestinian news site Dooz.

“For the first time in years the youth were not seeing themselves as victims anymore... there was the feeling that Palestinians were not just taking the fire and sitting, but rising and standing,” Abu Arab told AFP.

Young Palestinians have had enough with the “soft approach”, but that does not necessarily mean “they were in favour of Hamas”, he said.

Abu Arab referenced the death in Palestinian custody of Nizar Banat, a prominent critic of the PA, whose suspected killing by Palestinian security forces sparked protests.

Former Palestinian prime minister Salam Fayyad called the current situation “unprecedented”.

“I don’t know how far we are from really becoming a real crisis. It might already be [one] and it should be looked at by the leadership as a crisis.”

Speaking to a small group of reporters, he called for “a change of direction, beginning by listening to people, in particular the young people who are very frustrated with the occupation and the promises of freedom that remain unfulfilled”.

With Hamas-Fateh reconciliation seemingly out of reach and long-sought elections postponed indefinitely, Hamayel argued the “Beita model” could deliver change across the Palestinian territories.

“There are problems at the top, but here, on the ground, the Palestinians unite.”

SANAA — Dozens of Yemeni cyclists hit the road on  Wednesday with a shared goal — to spread peace in a country embroiled in conflict for more than seven years.

In the capital Sanaa, the cyclists prepared for their 320 kilometre  journey to the northern province of Saada, one of the areas devastated by the ongoing war between the government and the Houthi rebels.

Mohammed Al Jidadi checked his pedals before he set off with approximately 40 others on the busy streets of Sanaa.

Another cyclist nearby pumped air into his tyres, while a third young man in full cycling gear playfully carried his bike pretending to play the guitar.

They plan to ride north through Amran province to reach Saada.

“We are going to Saada to spread the message of peace,” Jidadi told AFP.

Yemen, the poorest country in the Arabian Peninsula, is devastated by conflict, coronavirus and a humanitarian crisis that the United Nations has called the world’s worst.

Millions of people have been displaced by the grinding war, and more than 80 per cent of Yemen’s 30 million people depend on aid.

But despite everything, the cyclists said they hoped their ride would have a positive impact.

“We don’t want cycling limited to one province, and we want to relay the message to all provinces that cycling is meant to reach all nations,” cyclist Mohammed Al Harazi told AFP.

The message of peace is more important than ever, the cyclists said.

Tens of thousands of people, mostly civilians, have been killed in Yemen since 2015, when a Saudi-led coalition intervened to support the internationally recognised government after Iran-allied Houthi rebels took control of Sanaa the year before.

A UN-brokered agreement reached in 2018 between the warring sides offered some hope, but a peaceful settlement has yet to materialise.

ALGIERS — Algeria's Foreign Minister Ramtane Lamamra said on Tuesday that his country has severed diplomatic relations with Morocco due to "hostile actions", following months of resurgent tensions between the North African rivals.

The countries have long accused one another of backing opposition movements as proxies, with Algeria's support for separatists in the disputed region of Western Sahara a particular bone of contention for Morocco.

"Algeria has decided to cut diplomatic relations with the kingdom of Morocco from today," Lamamra announced during a press conference.

"History has shown... Morocco has never stopped carrying out hostile actions against Algeria," he added.

In a statement later Tuesday, Morocco's foreign ministry said Algiers' move was "completely unjustified" but "expected given the logic of escalation seen in recent weeks".

Rabat added that the decision to cut ties was based on "false, even absurd pretexts".

The rupture followed a review of bilateral relations announced by Algeria last week as it alleged its neighbour was complicit in deadly forest fires that ravaged the country's north.

Lamamra accused Morocco's leaders of "responsibility for repeated crises" and behaviour that has "led to conflict instead of integration" in North Africa.

Late last month, Morocco’s King Mohamed VI deplored the tensions between the two countries, and invited Algeria’s President Abdelmadjid Tebboune “to make wisdom prevail” and “to work in unison for the development of relations” between the two countries.

‘Provocation’ 

But Algeria’s forest fires, which broke out on August 9 amid a blistering heatwave, burned tens of thousands of hectares of forest and killed at least 90 people, including more than 30 soldiers, further stoking tensions.

While critics say Algerian authorities failed to prepare for the blazes, Tebboune declared most of the fires were of “criminal” origin.

Algerian authorities have blamed the independence movement of the mainly Berber region of Kabylie extending along the Mediterranean coast east of the capital.

Algiers has accused Rabat of backing the separatists.

“The Moroccan provocation reached its climax when a Moroccan delegate to the United Nations demanded the independence of the people of the Kabylie region,” Lamamra said Tuesday.

Last month, Algeria recalled its ambassador to Rabat for consultations after Morocco’s envoy to the United Nations, Omar Hilale, expressed support for self-determination in that region.

At the time, Algeria’s foreign ministry said Morocco thus “publicly and explicitly supports an alleged right to self-determination of the Kabylie people”.

Algerian authorities have also accused the Movement for Self-determination of Kabylie (MAK) of involvement in lynching a man falsely accused of arson during the recent forest fires, an incident that sparked outrage.

Algeria last week accused Morocco of supporting the group, which it classifies as a “terrorist organisation”.

‘Bad decision’ 

“The incessant hostile acts carried out by Morocco against Algeria have necessitated the review of relations between the two countries,” the presidency had said.

It also said there would be an “intensification of security controls on the western borders” with Morocco.

The border between Algeria and Morocco has been closed since 1994.

Mohamed, a Moroccan bus driver, called Algeria’s latest move “a bad decision”.

“It’s like cutting ties with your next-door neighbour,” he told AFP.

The two North African countries along with Tunisia were united, he added, saying “there are no differences, this happens between governments”.

Algeria’s foreign minister also accused Morocco of leading “a media war... against Algeria, its people and its leaders”.

But Lamamra also said consular assistance to citizens of both countries would not be affected.

Relations between Algiers and Rabat have been fraught in past decades, especially over the flashpoint issue of the disputed Western Sahara.

Morocco considers the former Spanish colony an integral part of its kingdom, but Algeria has backed the Polisario movement which seeks independence there.

A normalisation deal between Morocco and Israel in December triggered fresh tensions between Rabat and Algiers because the US recognised Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara as part of the accord.

Lamamra on Tuesday accused the Israeli foreign minister of “senseless accusations and veiled threats” after Yair Lapid expressed “worries about the role played by Algeria in the region”.

On his first visit to Morocco since the countries normalised ties, Lapid said his concerns were based on fears Algeria was “getting close to Iran”, as well as “the campaign it waged against the admission of Israel as an observer member of the African Union”.

TUNIS — Tunisian President Kais Saied has extended his suspension of parliament “until further notice”, a month after sacking his prime minister and granting himself greater powers in a shock intervention that opponents decried as a coup.

In a statement issued by the presidency late on Monday, Saied also extended an order freezing immunity for lawmakers and said he would address the Tunisian people in the coming days, without providing further details.

Tunisia, hailed as a rare democratic success story in the Middle East and North Africa, has been mired in political crisis since Saied’s intervention, which comes as the country struggles with dire economic woes and the COVID-19 pandemic.

On July 25, Saied invoked the constitution to extend his authority, dismissing the head of government Hichem Mechichi and freezing parliament, in what activists have called a “purge” that has seen opponents, judges and businessmen arrested or banned from travel.

Saied issued “a presidential decree extending the exceptional measures... regarding the suspension of Parliament and lifting of the parliamentary immunity of its MPs until further notice”, the presidency said in the statement.

Saied’s intervention, which he said was necessary to prevent the country from collapse, sparked uncertainty for the north African nation.

He has yet to appoint a new government or reveal a “roadmap” for his decisions despite repeated demands by political parties.

While the president enjoys widespread popularity in Tunisia, his move has sparked fears in the international community that the cradle of the 2011 Arab Spring is regressing towards authoritarianism.

Analysts expect Saied will announce new measures to reassure the Tunisian public as well as the international community about his decisions.

Popular support 

The intervention has faced condemnation from judges and Saied’s opponents, in particular the Islamist-inspired Ennahdha Party, the largest bloc in parliament.

Several politicians, businessmen and judges, as well as members of parliament — who lost their immunity after Saied suspended the legislature — have said they have been banned from travelling abroad or put under house arrest without warning.

Their claims have sparked a chorus of condemnation, with critics denouncing “arbitrary” and “unjustified” measures.

A retired constitutional law professor, Saied has used Article 80 of the constitution adopted in 2014, which allows for exceptional measures if there is an “imminent danger” to national security, to justify his decision.

“The freedom to travel is a constitutional right which I promise to guarantee,” he said last week in response to critics.

“But some people will have to answer to the judicial authorities before being able to travel.”

Many Tunisians have backed Saied’s move to strip parliamentarians of their immunity, seen as a long-overdue move against a corrupt and inept political class.

He was voted into power in 2019 on the back of a campaign in which he pledged to fight corruption.

Ennahdha, seen as one of the key targets of Saied’s move, has called for a national dialogue — something the president quickly dismissed.

Shortly before Saied’s latest announcement, the party announced the dismissal of its executive committee.

Party leader and parliament speaker Rached Ghannouchi, who has faced criticism over his handling of the crisis, decided to form a new board “in order to meet the demands of the current period”, the party said in a statement.

It is yet to react to Saied’s extension of the parliament freeze.