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UN Says Notion of a Safe Zone in Southern Gaza 'Farcical'

Palestinians inspect the damage at the Dar Al-Arqam school, where displaced people shelter, after it was hit by an Israeli strike on Thursday, in Gaza City, April 4, 2025. REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa/File Photo
Palestinians inspect the damage at the Dar Al-Arqam school, where displaced people shelter, after it was hit by an Israeli strike on Thursday, in Gaza City, April 4, 2025. REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa/File Photo
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UN Says Notion of a Safe Zone in Southern Gaza 'Farcical'

Palestinians inspect the damage at the Dar Al-Arqam school, where displaced people shelter, after it was hit by an Israeli strike on Thursday, in Gaza City, April 4, 2025. REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa/File Photo
Palestinians inspect the damage at the Dar Al-Arqam school, where displaced people shelter, after it was hit by an Israeli strike on Thursday, in Gaza City, April 4, 2025. REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa/File Photo

The United Nations insisted on Friday there was no safe place for Palestinians ordered to leave Gaza City, and that Israeli-designated zones in the southern Gaza Strip were "places of death".

Since launching its air assault on Gaza City in August ahead of its ground offensive there, the Israeli military has repeatedly told Palestinians to head south.

"The notion of a safe zone in the south is farcical," James Elder, a spokesman for the UN children's agency UNICEF, told journalists in Geneva.

Speaking from Deir al-Balah in central Gaza, Elder pointed to how "bombs are dropped from the sky with chilling predictability; schools, which had been designated as temporary shelters are regularly reduced to rubble, (and) tents... are regularly engulfed in fire from air attacks".

The Israeli military has urged Palestinians to relocate to a "humanitarian area" in Al-Mawasi on the coast, where it says aid, medical care and humanitarian infrastructure will be provided.

Israel first declared the area a safe zone early in the two-year war but has carried out repeated strikes on it since, saying it is targeting Hamas.

Elder insisted that "the issuance of a general or a blanket evacuation order to civilians does not mean that those who remain behind lose their protection as civilians".

At the same time, he warned, the "so-called safe zones ... are also places of death".

Al-Mawasi, he pointed out, "is now one of the most densely populated places on Earth.

"It's grotesquely overcrowded and has been stripped of the most basic essentials of survival."

The UN had begun in late 2023 "debunking this concept of a unilaterally-declared safe zone", Elder said.

"The law is very clear," he stressed.

"It is the responsibility of the occupying power -- Israel -- to ensure that a safe zone has all the essentials for survival: that is nutrition, shelter and sanitation.

"None of those are present in a level that is fitting of a population," Elder said, adding that the UN at the start had "at least assumed that these places would not be bombed".

But over the past 18 months, the Israeli-designated safe-zones had been hit "dozens of time", and "people in tents have suffered from airstrikes".

Humanitarian agencies regularly warn that the amount of urgent supplies being allowed into the Gaza Strip are grossly insufficient to meet the immense needs of the population in the Israeli-besieged Palestinian territory.

"To cope with that situation, our colleagues, particularly in our hospital in Rafah, have decided to build our own materials," such as "home-made, wooden crutches", said Christian Cardon, spokesman for the International Committee of the Red Cross.

The ICRC announced on Wednesday that had been "forced" to suspend its activities in Gaza City due to Israel's intensified military operations.

"There are no longer any international staff in Gaza City. We had between two and five expatriates before," Cardon told AFP, adding that the ICRC has 350 staff, including 50 international staff, throughout the Gaza Strip.

The World Health Organization is calling for humanitarian corridors to allow access to hospitals, its representative in the Palestinian territories, Rik Peeperkorn, told reporters.

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Arab World

Beirut Transfers 128 Syrian Convicts Home

Lebanese army soldiers secure the area at the entrance of Zawtar al-Gharbiyah village, southern Lebanon, 23 June 2026, amid a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah. EPA/WAEL HAMZEH
Lebanese army soldiers secure the area at the entrance of Zawtar al-Gharbiyah village, southern Lebanon, 23 June 2026, amid a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah. EPA/WAEL HAMZEH
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Beirut Transfers 128 Syrian Convicts Home

Lebanese army soldiers secure the area at the entrance of Zawtar al-Gharbiyah village, southern Lebanon, 23 June 2026, amid a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah. EPA/WAEL HAMZEH
Lebanese army soldiers secure the area at the entrance of Zawtar al-Gharbiyah village, southern Lebanon, 23 June 2026, amid a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah. EPA/WAEL HAMZEH

Lebanon has transferred 128 Syrian convicts to their home country, a Lebanese security source told AFP on Wednesday, the second batch of handovers under an agreement the two sides signed earlier this year.

Overcrowded Lebanese prisons host around 2,000 Syrian nationals held on various charges.

Many are still awaiting trial, while hundreds have been brought before military courts on charges of "terrorism" or related offences, including attacks on Lebanese forces.

Others are in custody for alleged membership in militant or armed groups that were opposed to now-ousted Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, who was supported by Lebanon's Hezbollah during the Syrian civil war.

The security source, who requested anonymity, said that Beirut "handed over the second batch of Syrian convicts in Lebanon to Damascus, numbering 128 convicts" on Wednesday.

The transfer follows the handover of more than 130 Syrian detainees in March, under an agreement signed between the two countries the previous month, which will cover almost 300 convicts who have served 10 years or more in Lebanese prisons.

Under the agreement, they will be required to complete the remainder of their sentences in Syria.

At least 260 convicts have now been sent to Syria's Adra prison out of 356 in Lebanon's Roumieh, the source added.

The issue of the detainees had been a sticking point in Beirut-Damascus relations following Assad's overthrow in December 2024.

It was discussed by Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam during his visit to Damascus in May, where he met Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa.

Over the past year, both sides have repeatedly expressed their determination to open a new chapter in their relations.

Arab World

Syrian Troop Killings Expose Repeated Attacks, Security Lapses

Syrian army personnel on a military vehicle in Deir Hafer, rural Aleppo, in January 2026. (Reuters)
Syrian army personnel on a military vehicle in Deir Hafer, rural Aleppo, in January 2026. (Reuters)
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Syrian Troop Killings Expose Repeated Attacks, Security Lapses

Syrian army personnel on a military vehicle in Deir Hafer, rural Aleppo, in January 2026. (Reuters)
Syrian army personnel on a military vehicle in Deir Hafer, rural Aleppo, in January 2026. (Reuters)

The recent killing of two Syrian army members near Manbij, east of Aleppo, was not an isolated attack. It was part of a recurring pattern of strikes on government forces, exposing serious administrative and security gaps that groups opposed to Syria’s new administration are using to target its personnel.

Syria’s Ministry of Defense media and communications department said on June 20 that two soldiers from the 76th Division were killed after unknown gunmen attacked them near Manbij.

The soldiers were riding a motorcycle on a road near the city when they came under direct fire.

Since the fall of the Assad regime, Asharq Al-Awsat has tracked many similar attacks on Syrian security and army personnel. Most have occurred as members were heading to or leaving their posts, often on motorcycles or via irregular transport.

Many see the pattern as evidence of weak protection measures and poor organization of personnel rotations.

Rural Aleppo has witnessed several assassinations this year. Among the most prominent were the killing of two Syrian army members in March and another member of the Interior Ministry in April near the town of al-Rai.

Similar incidents have also been reported across most Syrian provinces, including Daraa, Latakia, rural Hama and Homs.

Embarrassing the Syrian state

Demands have grown for personnel to avoid moving alone, wearing military uniforms or using motorcycles in remote areas where the risk is high and support is hard to reach.

Major Khaled al-Abdullah, director of the Syrian interior minister’s office, said the defense and interior ministries had repeatedly issued circulars banning personnel from wearing official uniforms outside working hours and requiring them to follow safety measures suited to Syria’s current conditions.

He said the immediate aim of attacks by groups opposed to the new administration, including Islamic State and remnants of the ousted regime, was to “try to embarrass the Syrian state.”

Abdullah stressed that authorities were working hard to impose security, eliminate armed groups and organizations, and had made significant progress on what he called a difficult path.

But in remarks to Asharq Al-Awsat, he also pointed to “continued internal and external challenges that the Syrian state is working to overcome and whose danger it seeks to end.”

Manbij, the most dangerous route

Abu Mohammed al-Hussein, who oversees a cluster of checkpoints in eastern rural Aleppo, said the movement of personnel had become a problem. He said he had repeatedly asked for buses to transport rotating shift members, especially in rural areas far from the city center.

Hussein said one member of his checkpoint group survived an assassination attempt on the Manbij-al-Bab road in eastern rural Aleppo at the end of March. The incident pushed him to issue special orders regulating how his personnel move.

“A civilian car offered to take one of my men to Aleppo city,” he said. “After they had driven several miles, they claimed there was an emergency and said they had to return. As soon as he got out, the driver’s companion fired several shots at him with a pistol. Two hit his magazine pouch and one pierced his foot. He survived by a miracle.”

He said shift rotations are “decided centrally by sector commanders” and are often carried out at night because service areas are far from where personnel live. He said a ban on carrying weapons and moving through residential areas had also made personnel easier targets.

“With repeated assassination attempts, I issued a decision banning nighttime shift rotations, prohibiting movement in civilian cars or on motorcycles, which have also become easy targets, and limiting transport to road security vehicles,” he added.

Hussein said they were still waiting for approval of a request to allocate a bus to transport security and military checkpoint personnel deployed along the Aleppo-Manbij road.

He described it as “one of the most dangerous land routes,” linking Aleppo to outlying areas and Raqqa province, and passing through an area that remained for years under the control of the ousted regime and the Syrian Democratic Forces.

Ban on keeping weapons

Haider al-Mohammed, a special tasks member, disagreed. He said “transport buses are, in practice, the easy target” and are often attacked, meaning the problem of securing personnel goes beyond transport.

He said decisions that stripped personnel of the means to protect their safety and identity were the direct reason behind the rise in assassinations, alongside the exceptional conditions in the country and the process of “clearing out groups that believe they can create chaos and fear.”

He said among the most important of these decisions were “the ban on wearing face coverings, the ban on keeping registered weapons, and the strict instruction not to carry personal weapons, along with leniency over wearing official uniforms.”

As a result, he said, personnel are exposed, easy targets for these groups, and left without weapons to defend themselves.

On this point, Major Khaled al-Abdullah said Syria’s security and military institutions were working to “implement solutions to facilitate and reduce regular movement in a way that helps end the threat and strengthen the safety of their personnel.”

He said the pattern of attacks “confirms their randomness.” The failure to select specific targets or have prior knowledge of the personnel being targeted, he said, was “an attempt to create chaos and confuse the Syrian state.”

Arab World

Arab Parliament Speaker Stresses Need for Solidarity to Confront Regional Challenges

Arab Parliament Speaker Stresses Need for Solidarity to Confront Regional Challenges
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Arab Parliament Speaker Stresses Need for Solidarity to Confront Regional Challenges

Arab Parliament Speaker Stresses Need for Solidarity to Confront Regional Challenges

Speaker of the Arab Parliament Mohammed Al-Yamahi stressed the importance of solidarity, unity of ranks, positions, and voices, and strengthening consensus among Arab countries in addressing the growing challenges and risks facing the region, which require greater solidarity, cohesion, and joint Arab action now more than ever.

He made the remarks today during the preparatory committee meeting for the Eighth Conference of the Arab Parliament and Speakers of Arab Councils and Parliaments, which is being held in partnership with the Arab Inter-Parliamentary Union, SPA reported.

Al-Yamahi explained that this year's conference is being convened at a critical and exceptional stage for the Arab nation, requiring the highest levels of coordination, consultation, and unified positions on issues and challenges affecting the Arab world's present and future.

He noted that the conference will address several strategic issues, foremost among them the serious developments surrounding the Palestinian cause, the Arab world's primary concern.

It will also discuss recent highly dangerous security developments in the region and Iranian attacks against Arab states, as well as the topic of enhancing Arab digital sovereignty, which has emerged as a strategic issue driven by rapid digital transformation.

He said the issue calls for the development of a unified Arab parliamentary vision that protects Arab interests, strengthens digital security, and supports sustainable development efforts.