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Israel Fired at Vehicles Belonging to Syria's New Military, Killing 3

An Israeli soldier mans a machine gun atop a military vehicle as they leave the buffer zone on the border between Israel and Syria, near the Druze village of Majdal Shams, in the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights, 20 December 2024. EPA/ATEF SAFADI
An Israeli soldier mans a machine gun atop a military vehicle as they leave the buffer zone on the border between Israel and Syria, near the Druze village of Majdal Shams, in the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights, 20 December 2024. EPA/ATEF SAFADI
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Israel Fired at Vehicles Belonging to Syria's New Military, Killing 3

An Israeli soldier mans a machine gun atop a military vehicle as they leave the buffer zone on the border between Israel and Syria, near the Druze village of Majdal Shams, in the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights, 20 December 2024. EPA/ATEF SAFADI
An Israeli soldier mans a machine gun atop a military vehicle as they leave the buffer zone on the border between Israel and Syria, near the Druze village of Majdal Shams, in the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights, 20 December 2024. EPA/ATEF SAFADI

The Israeli army said it fired at vehicles in Syria loaded with weapons near a buffer zone established under a 1974 agreement between Syria and Israel.
The strike in the town of Ghadir al-Bustan in Quneitra province killed three people, including two members of Syria's Military Operations Administration, the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
The Military Operations Administration is run Syria’s de facto leadership under Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, which did not comment on the attack. The attack coincided with Syrian security operations to search homes for weapons, according to the war monitor.
The Israeli military said they located vehicles carrying weapons and “fired a warning shot adjacent to the vehicles, and the vehicles drove away from the area.” Asked about casualties, the Israeli military said it had no information, reported The Associated Press.
Israeli forces captured the UN-patrolled buffer zone in the Golan Heights following former Syrian President Bashar Assad’s fall last month. The military has been also conducting incursions outside the buffer zone, prompting local protests.

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Beirut Blast Investigator Resumes Work After Two Years

An aerial view shows the massive damage at Beirut port's grain silos and the area around it on August 5, 2020, one day after a massive explosion hit the heart of the Lebanese capital. (AFP)
An aerial view shows the massive damage at Beirut port's grain silos and the area around it on August 5, 2020, one day after a massive explosion hit the heart of the Lebanese capital. (AFP)
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Beirut Blast Investigator Resumes Work After Two Years

An aerial view shows the massive damage at Beirut port's grain silos and the area around it on August 5, 2020, one day after a massive explosion hit the heart of the Lebanese capital. (AFP)
An aerial view shows the massive damage at Beirut port's grain silos and the area around it on August 5, 2020, one day after a massive explosion hit the heart of the Lebanese capital. (AFP)

Lebanese judge Tarek Bitar resumed his investigation into the deadly 2020 Beirut port blast on Thursday, charging 10 people including security, customs and military personnel, a judicial official said.

The fresh charges come after a two-year hiatus in the investigation into the August 4, 2020 explosion that killed more than 220 people, injured thousands and devastated swathes of Lebanon's capital.

Authorities said the explosion was triggered by a fire in a warehouse where a huge stockpile of ammonium nitrate fertilizer had been haphazardly stored for years.

But nobody has been held responsible for the blast, one of history's largest non-nuclear explosions.

The probe stalled two years ago after Lebanese group Hezbollah had accused Bitar of bias and demanded his dismissal, and after officials named in the investigation had filed a flurry of lawsuits to prevent it from going forward.

The resumption comes with Hezbollah's influence weakened after its recent war with Israel.

It also follows the election of a Lebanese president after the top position had been vacant for more than two years, with the new head of state Joseph Aoun last week pledging to work towards the "independence of the judiciary".

The judicial official told AFP that "procedures in the case have resumed", speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.

The official said that "a new charge sheet has been issued, charging three employees and seven high-ranking officers in the Lebanese army, in the General Security, (and) in customs" with negligence and "possible intent to commit murder". Their interrogations would begin next month.

In March and April, "investigating sessions" would resume for those previously charged in the case, including former ministers, lawmakers, security and military officers, judges and port management employees, after which Bitar would ask public prosecutors to issue indictments, according to the judicial official.

Analysts say Hezbollah's weakening in its war with Israel last year allowed Lebanon's deeply divided political class to elect Aoun last week and back his naming of Nawaf Salam as premier on Monday.

Salam, until recently the presiding judge at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, on Tuesday promised "justice for the victims of the Beirut port blast".

Hundreds of individuals and organizations, including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, had previously called for the United Nations to establish a fact-finding mission on the disaster -- a demand Lebanese officials have repeatedly rejected.

Cecile Roukoz, a lawyer whose brother died in the explosion, said she was optimistic after "the promises made by the president and the prime minister, then the probe resuming".

"There is hope that the rights of the victims, for whom we never stopped fighting, won't be forgotten," said the attorney, one of several representing the relatives of those killed.

Visiting Lebanon on Thursday, UN rights chief Volker Turk called for the "resumption of an independent investigation into the explosion".

"I repeat that those responsible for that tragedy must be held to account and offer the support of my office in this regard," he said.

The probe has been repeatedly stalled since 2020.

In December of that year, lead investigator Fadi Sawan charged former prime minister Hassan Diab -- who had resigned in the explosion's aftermath -- and three ex-ministers with negligence.

But Sawan was later removed from the case after mounting political pressure, and the probe was suspended.

His successor, Bitar, also summoned Diab for questioning and asked parliament, without success, to lift the immunity of lawmakers who had served as ministers.

The interior ministry also refused to execute arrest warrants issued by Bitar, further undermining his efforts.

The public prosecutor at the time, Ghassan Oueidat, thwarted his attempt to resume investigations in early 2023 after Bitar charged him in the case.