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Lebanon to Press Israel to Ceasefire as Latest Washington Talks Begin

Mourners react over the coffin of Lebanese Civil Defense member, Ahmad Noura, who was killed the previous day in an Israeli airstrike during a funeral procession in the coastal city of Sidon, Lebanon, Wednesday, May 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
Mourners react over the coffin of Lebanese Civil Defense member, Ahmad Noura, who was killed the previous day in an Israeli airstrike during a funeral procession in the coastal city of Sidon, Lebanon, Wednesday, May 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
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Lebanon to Press Israel to Ceasefire as Latest Washington Talks Begin

Mourners react over the coffin of Lebanese Civil Defense member, Ahmad Noura, who was killed the previous day in an Israeli airstrike during a funeral procession in the coastal city of Sidon, Lebanon, Wednesday, May 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)
Mourners react over the coffin of Lebanese Civil Defense member, Ahmad Noura, who was killed the previous day in an Israeli airstrike during a funeral procession in the coastal city of Sidon, Lebanon, Wednesday, May 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)

Lebanon will demand Israel cease fire at face-to-face talks that began in Washington on Thursday, a senior Lebanese official said, as Iran-backed Hezbollah and Israel continued to trade blows despite a US-backed truce declared last month.

A State Department official confirmed that a meeting of Lebanese and Israeli envoys, along with US officials, had started at about 9 a.m. EDT (1300 GMT).

The talks, which are expected to continue on Friday, are the sides' third meeting since hostilities reignited between Hezbollah and Israel on March 2. Beirut is attending despite strong objections from Shi'ite Muslim Hezbollah.

An Israeli government spokesperson said the talks were taking place with the goal of disarming Hezbollah and reaching a peace agreement.

Fought in parallel to the US-Iran conflict, the Hezbollah-Israel war has rumbled on since US President Donald Trump declared a ceasefire on April 16 - though hostilities have largely been contained to southern Lebanon since then. The ceasefire is due to expire on Sunday.

With Lebanon's health ministry reporting 22 people killed in Israeli strikes on Wednesday, including eight children, the senior Lebanese official said the Lebanese delegation would seek "a ceasefire that Israel implements". The Israeli military said an explosive drone launched by Hezbollah fell within Israeli territory near the border and injured several Israeli civilians. Israel has kept troops in a self-declared security zone in south Lebanon, saying this aims to shield northern Israel from attack by Hezbollah, which fired hundreds of rockets and drones at Israel during the war.

The Israeli military said it carried out a new wave of attacks on Hezbollah sites in southern Lebanon on Thursday. Hezbollah said it carried out 17 attacks on Israeli troops in the south on Wednesday.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun's decision to pursue the talks reflects deep divisions in Lebanon over Hezbollah.

When the April 16 ceasefire was announced, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Hezbollah's disarmament would be a fundamental demand in peace talks with Lebanon.

The Washington meetings mark the highest-level contact between Lebanon and Israel in decades.

Both Lebanon and Israel are broadening their delegations for this round, after the sides were represented by their ambassadors to Washington in the previous two meetings.

The Lebanese health ministry says the war has killed 2,896 people in Lebanon since March 2, including 589 women, children and medics. Its toll does not say how many combatants have been killed.

Some 1.2 million people have been driven from their homes in Lebanon, many of them fleeing from the south.

Israel says 17 of its soldiers have been killed in southern Lebanon, along with two civilians in northern Israel.

 

 

 

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Arab World

New Gaza-bound Flotilla Sets Sail from Türkiye

Global Sumud Flotilla Steering Committee members Susan Abdallah, Muhammad Nadir Al-Nuri, Suemeyra Akdeniz Ordu, Maimon Herawati, Thiago Avila and Saif Abukeshek, Eva Saldana, Greenpeace Spain; Maria Serra, GSF Catalunya and Oscar Camps, Open Arms attend a press conference as humanitarian flotilla prepares to depart for Gaza, from Barcelona, Spain, April 12, 2026. REUTERS/Albert Gea
Global Sumud Flotilla Steering Committee members Susan Abdallah, Muhammad Nadir Al-Nuri, Suemeyra Akdeniz Ordu, Maimon Herawati, Thiago Avila and Saif Abukeshek, Eva Saldana, Greenpeace Spain; Maria Serra, GSF Catalunya and Oscar Camps, Open Arms attend a press conference as humanitarian flotilla prepares to depart for Gaza, from Barcelona, Spain, April 12, 2026. REUTERS/Albert Gea
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New Gaza-bound Flotilla Sets Sail from Türkiye

Global Sumud Flotilla Steering Committee members Susan Abdallah, Muhammad Nadir Al-Nuri, Suemeyra Akdeniz Ordu, Maimon Herawati, Thiago Avila and Saif Abukeshek, Eva Saldana, Greenpeace Spain; Maria Serra, GSF Catalunya and Oscar Camps, Open Arms attend a press conference as humanitarian flotilla prepares to depart for Gaza, from Barcelona, Spain, April 12, 2026. REUTERS/Albert Gea
Global Sumud Flotilla Steering Committee members Susan Abdallah, Muhammad Nadir Al-Nuri, Suemeyra Akdeniz Ordu, Maimon Herawati, Thiago Avila and Saif Abukeshek, Eva Saldana, Greenpeace Spain; Maria Serra, GSF Catalunya and Oscar Camps, Open Arms attend a press conference as humanitarian flotilla prepares to depart for Gaza, from Barcelona, Spain, April 12, 2026. REUTERS/Albert Gea

Dozens of ships set sail from southwestern Türkiye as part of a Gaza-bound aid flotilla on Thursday, an organizer told AFP.

"Around 50 ships sailed from Marmaris around an hour ago," Gorkem Duru, a member of the Türkiye branch of the Global Sumud Fleet said.

"They will be joined by four or five ships from the Freedom Flotilla Coalition in international waters. Now they are sailing for Gaza," he added, AFP reported.

The Global Sumud Flotilla will be the third initiative in a year aiming at breaking an Israeli blockade on war-ravaged Gaza, which has suffered severe shortages of food, water, medicine and fuel since the Israel-Hamas war broke out in October 2023.

Israeli forces intercepted the second flotilla in international waters off Greece on April 30, expelling most of the activists to Europe, but arrested two of them who were held for 10 days.

Rights groups said the arrests were illegal and that the men suffered abuse while they were in Israeli detention.

Israeli authorities have rejected the abuse allegations but have filed no charges against them.

Arab World

Palestinian President Pledges to Hold Elections, Pursue Reforms

FILED - 16 August 2022, Berlin: Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority, answers questions from journalists at a press conference after his meeting with the German Chancellor. Photo: Wolfgang Kumm/dpa
FILED - 16 August 2022, Berlin: Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority, answers questions from journalists at a press conference after his meeting with the German Chancellor. Photo: Wolfgang Kumm/dpa
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Palestinian President Pledges to Hold Elections, Pursue Reforms

FILED - 16 August 2022, Berlin: Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority, answers questions from journalists at a press conference after his meeting with the German Chancellor. Photo: Wolfgang Kumm/dpa
FILED - 16 August 2022, Berlin: Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority, answers questions from journalists at a press conference after his meeting with the German Chancellor. Photo: Wolfgang Kumm/dpa

Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas on Thursday pledged to press ahead with reforms within the Palestinian Authority, saying he was prepared to hold long-delayed presidential and parliamentary elections.

Abbas's Fatah party began a three-day conference to elect a new central committee, its highest leadership body, for the first time in 10 years as it faces existential challenges in the wake of the Gaza war.

"We renew our full commitment to continuing work on implementing all the reform measures we pledged... We are ready to hold presidential and legislative elections," Abbas said in an address to the congress, though he did not provide a timeline for the vote, AFP reported.

"The Palestinian people are the only people in the world living under occupation. Holding our conference today on our homeland's soil confirms our determination to continue on the democratic path and open the way for youth and women," the 90-year-old veteran leader said.

Fatah's central committee is expected to play a key role in the post-Abbas era, with many observers wondering whether he might finally step down after more than two decades at the helm, despite the lack of a clear successor.

The conference comes as the Palestinian national movement faces some of its "most serious challenges in our struggle", Jibril Rajoub, the current secretary general of the committee, told AFP ahead of the congress.

He expressed hope that the conference, repeatedly delayed, would contribute to "ensuring and protecting the establishment of a Palestinian state on the world's agenda and protecting the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people".

Key figures competing to replace Abbas include Rajoub and PA deputy Hussein al-Sheikh.

Meanwhile, the president's eldest son, Yasser Abbas, is on the ballot to join the central committee, having risen in prominence over recent years after he was named the president's special representative despite largely residing in Canada.

Arab World

Palestinian Fatah Party to Elect Leaders for First Time in Decade

President Mahmoud Abbas presiding over a meeting of Fatah's 'Revolutionary Council' (Archive - WAFA)
President Mahmoud Abbas presiding over a meeting of Fatah's 'Revolutionary Council' (Archive - WAFA)
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Palestinian Fatah Party to Elect Leaders for First Time in Decade

President Mahmoud Abbas presiding over a meeting of Fatah's 'Revolutionary Council' (Archive - WAFA)
President Mahmoud Abbas presiding over a meeting of Fatah's 'Revolutionary Council' (Archive - WAFA)

Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah movement is due on Thursday to elect a new central committee for the first time in 10 years, as it faces existential challenges in the wake of the Gaza war.

During the three-day general conference, the movement will vote on the central committee, its highest leadership body, even as analysts warn of Fatah's diminishing legitimacy in the face of endemic corruption and its lack of progress on Palestinian statehood -- especially amid an intensified Israeli settlement drive, reported AFP.

The committee is expected to play a key role in the post-Abbas era, with some wondering whether the 90-year-old leader might finally step down after more than two decades at the helm, despite the lack of a clear heir apparent.

The conference comes as the Palestinian national movement is facing some of "the most serious challenges in our struggle", said Jibril Rajoub, the current secretary general of the committee.

He expressed hope that the conference, repeatedly delayed, would contribute to "ensuring and protecting the establishment of a Palestinian state on the world's agenda and protecting the Palestine Liberation Organization as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people".

Fatah has historically been the main component of the PLO, which includes most Palestinian factions but excludes Hamas and Islamic Jihad groups.

In recent decades, Fatah's popularity and influence have dwindled amid internal divisions and growing public frustration over the stagnation of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

The sense of disappointment led to a surge in support for rival Hamas, which made huge political gains in the occupied West Bank in 2006 elections that it won handily, before going on to expel Fatah from the Gaza Strip almost entirely after a bout of factional fighting.

Hani al-Masri, director of the Palestinian Center for Policy Research and Strategic Studies (Masarat), told AFP that Fatah now merely uses the PLO to provide itself with legitimacy, "a legitimacy that is eroding in the absence of a unified national project, elections and national consensus".

He added that Thursday's conference was overshadowed by competition over seats on the central committee, "while the national project is conspicuously absent from the discussions".

Rajoub nonetheless declared that the conference was a first step towards "putting the Palestinian house in order, to build a partner for establishing a (Palestinian) state".

- Succession -

The conference will be held over three days, with approximately 2,580 Fatah members participating, the majority of them in Ramallah, though several hundred are also spread across Gaza, Cairo and Beirut.

They are expected to elect 18 representatives to the central committee and 80 to the movement's parliament, known as the revolutionary council.

Fatah is the main party within the Palestinian Authority (PA), which has been touted abroad as a natural partner in rebuilding and running the Gaza Strip after Israel's devastating war with Hamas there.

But Fatah remains marginalized in the territory, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly vowed that it, the PA and Hamas will have no role in post-war governance.

Despite repeated declarations from the movement that it is working as a "united front", major figures will be absent from Thursday's conference, notably Nasser al-Qudwa, a key Palestinian leader who is boycotting the gathering.

"This conference is illegitimate, and this leadership that has usurped power is illegitimate and its time is up," said Qudwa, a nephew of late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.

Key figures competing to replace Abbas include Rajoub and PA deputy Hussein al-Sheikh.

Also missing is Marwan Barghouti, who is considered a uniquely unifying Palestinian leader often cited as a possible successor to Abbas, but is serving a life sentence in Israeli prison after being found guilty of involvement in deadly attacks.

Meanwhile, the president's eldest son, Yasser Abbas, is on the ballot to join the central committee, having risen in prominence over recent years after he was named the president's special representative despite largely residing in Canada.

Al-Masri said the president's son's bid for a seat "indicates a trend towards dynastic succession", which is "extremely dangerous for Fatah, the Palestinian Authority and the Palestinian cause".