Algeria Eases More Coronavirus Restrictions, Including Travel Curbs and Curfew

People walk in Algiers, Algeria March 12, 2020. (Reuters)
People walk in Algiers, Algeria March 12, 2020. (Reuters)
TT
20

Algeria Eases More Coronavirus Restrictions, Including Travel Curbs and Curfew

People walk in Algiers, Algeria March 12, 2020. (Reuters)
People walk in Algiers, Algeria March 12, 2020. (Reuters)

Algeria said on Saturday it will further ease its coronavirus lockdown, including shortening an overnight curfew and lifting some travel curbs.

In addition, large mosques will be allowed to reopen, along with beaches, entertainment venues, hotels, restaurants and cafes.

The North African country has recorded 34,155 coronavirus infections, with 1,282 deaths.

The new measures include lifting a travel ban on 29 provinces from Aug. 9 until the end of the month. During that period, a curfew will be shortened and will run from 11 pm to 6 am from the current 8 pm to 5 am, the government said.

Mosques with a capacity of more than 1,000 worshipers can reopen from August 15, though Friday prayers, which attract larger numbers of people, will remain banned throughout the country.

The use of air conditioners in mosques also remain banned, as does a prohibition of access for women, vulnerable people and children under 15 years.

The government will also allow the reopening of beaches and entertainment venues, as well as restaurants, cafes and hotels from next Saturday.

It said social distancing and protection masks would be compulsory, and warned any violation of preventive measures against the novel coronavirus would prompt it to reimpose more restrictions.

Algeria resumed some economic activity in June, mainly in the construction and public works sectors, and allowed the reopening of some businesses.

It lifted a curfew and travel restrictions for its remaining 19 provinces in July.



Israeli Likud Party Ministers Urge Netanyahu to Annex West Bank

Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)
Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)
TT
20

Israeli Likud Party Ministers Urge Netanyahu to Annex West Bank

Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)
Israeli soldiers in Tubas in the north of the occupied West Bank on September 11, 2024. (AFP)

Cabinet ministers in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party called on Wednesday for Israel to annex the Israeli-occupied West Bank before the Knesset recesses at the end of the month.

They issued a petition ahead of Netanyahu's meeting next week with US President Donald Trump, where discussions are expected to center on a potential 60-day Gaza ceasefire and hostage release deal with Hamas.

The petition was signed by 15 cabinet ministers and Amir Ohana, speaker of the Knesset, Israel's parliament.

There was no immediate response from the prime minister's office. Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, long a confidant of Netanyahu, did not sign the petition. He has been in Washington since Monday for talks on Iran and Gaza.

"We ministers and members of Knesset call for applying Israeli sovereignty and law immediately on Judea and Samaria," they wrote, using the biblical names for the West Bank captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war.

Their petition cited Israel's recent achievements against both Iran and Iran's allies and the opportunity afforded by the strategic partnership with the US and support of Trump.

It said the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on Israel demonstrated that the concept of Jewish settlement blocs alongside the establishment of a Palestinian state poses an existential threat to Israel.

"The task must be completed, the existential threat removed from within, and another massacre in the heart of the country must be prevented," the petition stated.

Most countries regard Jewish settlements in the West Bank, many of which cut off Palestinian communities from one another, as a violation of international law.

With each advance of Israeli settlements and roads, the West Bank becomes more fractured, further undermining prospects for a contiguous land on which Palestinians could build a sovereign state long envisaged in Middle East peacemaking.

Israel's pro-settler politicians have been emboldened by the return to the White House of Trump, who has proposed Palestinians leave Gaza, a suggestion widely condemned across the Middle East and beyond.