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Yemen’s Hadi Appoints New Head of Shura Council, Attorney General, Cabinet Secretary

President Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi chairs a meeting with cabinet ministers, Saba News Agency
President Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi chairs a meeting with cabinet ministers, Saba News Agency
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Yemen’s Hadi Appoints New Head of Shura Council, Attorney General, Cabinet Secretary

President Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi chairs a meeting with cabinet ministers, Saba News Agency
President Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi chairs a meeting with cabinet ministers, Saba News Agency

The Southern Transitional Council (STC) in Yemen announced its rejection of “unilateral” decisions issued recently by President Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi, saying that they undermine the Riyadh Agreement.

A presidential decree released on Friday had appointed a new attorney general and Shura Council head.

Former prime minister Ahmed Ubaid bin Dagher was appointed as the head of the Shura Council and Ahmed Al-Mosai as attorney general.

Each of Abdullah Muhammad Abu Al-Ghaith and Taha Abdullah Jaafar Aman were appointed as deputy heads of the Shura Council.

The appointments came around a month after a new government was formed under the Riyadh Agreement.

Under Saudi sponsorship, the agreement was signed by the former government and the STC.

Hadi’s decision to have a change of leadership at the Shura Council comes as an apparent effort to rebuild Yemeni institutions whose performance was disrupted by the war waged by Iran-backed Houthi militias.

Al-Mosai, the new attorney general, held the post of deputy minister of interior and has worked on sensitive issues such as the war on terror and assassinations.

It is worth noting that Muti' Ahmad Dammaj was assigned the post of Secretary-General to the premiership.

“These decisions (appointments) are a dangerous escalation and a clear and unacceptable departure from what has been agreed upon, and undermining the Riyadh agreement,” the STC spokesman, Ali Al Kathiri, said today, on Twitter.

More so, the Club of Southern Judges criticized Friday's decrees.

The club said the appointment of the new attorney general violated the Yemeni constitution and judicial authority law.

There should have been a proposal by the president of the supreme judicial council for the appointment of the attorney general as the judicial authority law and its procedural amendments state, the club said.

Al-Mosai did not come from the judicial authority but from the ministry of interior, it stressed.

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Arab World

Israel Opens Criminal Probes Over Killings of Hind Rajab and Gaza Rescue Workers, Military Says

Hind Rajab. (Family handout/AFP/Getty Images)
Hind Rajab. (Family handout/AFP/Getty Images)
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Israel Opens Criminal Probes Over Killings of Hind Rajab and Gaza Rescue Workers, Military Says

Hind Rajab. (Family handout/AFP/Getty Images)
Hind Rajab. (Family handout/AFP/Getty Images)

Israel's military will open internal investigations over its troops' killings in Gaza of Palestinian girl Hind Rajab in January 2024 and 15 emergency and aid workers in March 2025, it said on Wednesday, although rights groups said such probes rarely lead to convictions.

The military said the investigation decisions followed probes by its Fact-Finding and Assessment Mechanism. It released decisions regarding five incidents involving the deaths of Palestinians. They included an examination ‌of the killings ‌of seven aid workers with the World ‌Central ⁠Kitchen charity in ⁠April 2024. On that incident, the military said there was "no reasonable suspicion of criminal misconduct that would justify the opening of a criminal investigation."

"For more than a thousand days, the Israeli army has been conducting intensive combat across numerous fronts, carrying out a wide range of military missions ⁠in an exceptionally complex operational reality," the Israeli ‌military said.

"As part of the military's ‌obligations under international law and Israeli domestic law, the army ‌examines exceptional incidents that occurred during combat," the military said.

Israeli ‌rights groups say that criminal misconduct investigations into Israeli troops over the killing of Palestinians rarely lead to convictions.

"Nearly zero indictments are served relative to the number of complaints of soldiers and ‌commanders who commit offenses. In rare cases when commanders or soldiers are convicted, they receive ridiculously ⁠lenient ⁠sentences compared with the severity of the offense," a spokesperson for the Israeli rights organization Yesh Din said.

During Israel's offensive in response to an October 7, 2023, Hamas attack, Hind Rajab was pinned down in a car for hours, begging Palestinian medics over a mobile phone to send help, while her aunt, uncle and three cousins already lay dead.

When an ambulance finally arrived, contact with the girl and the rescuers themselves was lost. Twelve days later, the bodies of the girl, her relatives and two ambulance workers were recovered from the area.

Arab World

Syria Arrests Assad-era Officer who Fled Austria after Conviction

A man walks past heavily-damaged and destroyed buildings in the Jobar suburb northeast of Damascus on August 12, 2026. (Photo by LOUAI BESHARA / AFP)
A man walks past heavily-damaged and destroyed buildings in the Jobar suburb northeast of Damascus on August 12, 2026. (Photo by LOUAI BESHARA / AFP)
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Syria Arrests Assad-era Officer who Fled Austria after Conviction

A man walks past heavily-damaged and destroyed buildings in the Jobar suburb northeast of Damascus on August 12, 2026. (Photo by LOUAI BESHARA / AFP)
A man walks past heavily-damaged and destroyed buildings in the Jobar suburb northeast of Damascus on August 12, 2026. (Photo by LOUAI BESHARA / AFP)

Syrian security forces have arrested a former Assad-era security officer who fled Austria after being sentenced to eight years in prison for abusing detainees and returned to his hometown in southern Syria, state news agency SANA said on Tuesday night.

Lieutenant Colonel Musab Abu Rukba was arrested in the city of Nawa in Daraa province by internal security forces in coordination ⁠with the counter-terrorism ⁠department, SANA said, citing the security forces.

Abu Rukba had been convicted by a Vienna court last month of bodily harm, aggravated coercion and sexual assault against detained opponents of former President Bashar al-Assad while he headed the police’s criminal investigations department in the northern city of Raqqa more than a ⁠decade ago.

He had pleaded not guilty.

Reuters reported on Friday that Abu Rukba had left Austria while challenging his eight-year sentence on appeal and arrived in Nawa in early August, where his family held a reception to celebrate his return.

SANA said on Tuesday that Abu Rukba had entered Syria illegally after fleeing Austria and that authorities had tracked him down in Nawa. He had been referred to the relevant authorities to complete legal procedures ahead of prosecution, it said.

It was ⁠not immediately ⁠clear what charges Abu Rukba could face in Syria or whether Austria had requested his arrest or extradition.

A spokesperson for the Austrian court that convicted him told Reuters at the time that Abu Rukba had not been considered a flight risk before his trial because he had lived in Austria since 2014 and was seeking asylum there with his family.

He was not held in custody during the trial or subjected to other restrictions, and his departure from Austria did not breach Austrian laws or court orders while the appeals process remained underway, the spokesperson said.

Arab World

Israel Says It Recovered Remains of Soldier Killed in Lebanon in 1982

Destruction is pictured in the village of Arnoun as seen from nearby Marjeyoun in southern Lebanon on August 11, 2026. (AFP)
Destruction is pictured in the village of Arnoun as seen from nearby Marjeyoun in southern Lebanon on August 11, 2026. (AFP)
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Israel Says It Recovered Remains of Soldier Killed in Lebanon in 1982

Destruction is pictured in the village of Arnoun as seen from nearby Marjeyoun in southern Lebanon on August 11, 2026. (AFP)
Destruction is pictured in the village of Arnoun as seen from nearby Marjeyoun in southern Lebanon on August 11, 2026. (AFP)

The Israeli military said on Tuesday it had repatriated the remains of Sgt First Class Yehuda Katz, a soldier killed in Lebanon 44 years ago, in a joint operation with the Mossad intelligence agency.

Katz was the last Israeli soldier declared missing in the Sultan Yacoub battle against Syrian forces in eastern Lebanon in 1982.

"His return to Israel was made possible through efforts based on accurate intelligence... that lasted more than four decades," the military said in a statement.

It is not clear where his body was found.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu commended the security forces and said that "for many years, I approved numerous clandestine operations to locate the missing soldiers of Sultan Yacoub. I promised their families that we would never stop working to bring them home."

In a separate statement, President Isaac Herzog said that "the circle that remained an open and bleeding wound from the Battle of Sultan Yacoub is finally closed," and that he had kept a photograph of Yehuda Katz hanging in his office as "a daily reminder of our sacred duty to bring our sons home and leave no one behind".

Katz's remains were brought to Israel and identified at an institute for the identification of fallen soldiers under the military rabbinate, the military said.

Three Israeli soldiers had been missing for decades after the Sultan Yacoub battle. In 2019, the military announced the repatriation of the remains of Sgt First Class Zachariah Baumel, while in May 2025 it said it had recovered the body of Sgt First Class Tzvika Feldman "in the heart of Syria".