Lebanon’s Geagea Says Judicial Decisions against Party Unlawful

Samir Geagea, the leader of the Lebanese Forces (LF) party, speaks during an interview with Reuters at his residence in Maarab, Lebanon November 29, 2021. (Reuters)
Samir Geagea, the leader of the Lebanese Forces (LF) party, speaks during an interview with Reuters at his residence in Maarab, Lebanon November 29, 2021. (Reuters)
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Lebanon’s Geagea Says Judicial Decisions against Party Unlawful

Samir Geagea, the leader of the Lebanese Forces (LF) party, speaks during an interview with Reuters at his residence in Maarab, Lebanon November 29, 2021. (Reuters)
Samir Geagea, the leader of the Lebanese Forces (LF) party, speaks during an interview with Reuters at his residence in Maarab, Lebanon November 29, 2021. (Reuters)

Lebanese Forces (LF) leader Samir Geagea said on Saturday that recent judicial decisions against his party were against the law.

Speaking at a news conference days after a judge charged him over deadly violence in Beirut in October, Geagea said that the judicial decisions were aimed at tarnishing the image of the LF.

"The attempts to isolate, encircle, intimidate and abolish the Lebanese Forces continue to this day... And the latest attempt in this regard was judicial decisions that were born-dead because they are against every law," he said, without mentioning the charge.

Seven people, all of them followers of the Iran-backed Shiite Hezbollah party and its Shiite ally the Amal Movement, were killed in the Oct. 14 clashes near an old frontline of the 1975-90 civil war.

Geagea, a leading opponent of Hezbollah, was summoned to a hearing at military intelligence last October over the violence, but did not attend.

The Oct. 14 violence began as people were gathering for a protest called by Hezbollah against the judge investigating the 2020 Beirut port blast.

Hezbollah accused the LF of mounting an ambush to try to drag the country to a civil war.

Geagea has said the trouble began when supporters of the Shiite parties entered the Christian neighborhood of Ain al-Remmaneh where they vandalized cars and four residents were wounded before a shot was fired.

Geagea was speaking at an event to launch the candidacy of an LF candidate who is running in a May parliamentary election.

The Lebanese Forces media officer, Elie Kayrouz, said in a statement on Saturday that the charge is "political prejudice and an apparent slander against the Forces and Samir Geagea" ahead of the parliamentary election.



Scores Killed in Gaza as Israel Launches New Incursion in North

FILE PHOTO: People survey the destruction at Gaza's Jabalia refugee camp, following Israeli strikes on the enclave, October 14, 2023 in this still image from video obtained by REUTERS/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: People survey the destruction at Gaza's Jabalia refugee camp, following Israeli strikes on the enclave, October 14, 2023 in this still image from video obtained by REUTERS/File Photo
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Scores Killed in Gaza as Israel Launches New Incursion in North

FILE PHOTO: People survey the destruction at Gaza's Jabalia refugee camp, following Israeli strikes on the enclave, October 14, 2023 in this still image from video obtained by REUTERS/File Photo
FILE PHOTO: People survey the destruction at Gaza's Jabalia refugee camp, following Israeli strikes on the enclave, October 14, 2023 in this still image from video obtained by REUTERS/File Photo

At least 24 people were killed and dozens of others wounded in Israeli airstrikes on a Gaza mosque and a school sheltering displaced people early on Sunday, Palestinian officials said.

A strike was carried out on the mosque near the Al-Aqsa Hospital in Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.
Eyewitnesses said the number of casualties could rise as the mosque was being used to house displaced people.

The Israeli military said it had conducted "precise strikes on Hamas terrorists" who were operating within command and control centres embedded in Ibn Rushd School and the Shuhada al-Aqsa Mosque in the area of Deir al-Balah.

Israel's military assault on Gaza has killed nearly 42,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza's health ministry. It has also displaced nearly all of the enclave's 2.3 million people, caused a hunger crisis and led to genocide allegations at the World Court that Israel denies.

The military meanwhile announced a new air and ground offensive in Jabaliya, in northern Gaza, home to a densely populated refugee camp dating back to the 1948 war surrounding Israel's creation. It circulated photos and video footage showing a column of tanks heading toward the area.

The military said its forces had encircled Jabaliya as warplanes struck militant sides ahead of their advance. Over the course of the war, Israel has carried out several large operations there, only to see militants regroup.

Israel also ordered new evacuations in northern Gaza, which largely emptied out in the early weeks of the war when Israel ordered its entire population to flee south. Up to 300,000 people are estimated to have remained there despite harsh conditions and heavy destruction.

“We are in a new phase of the war,” the military said in leaflets dropped over the area. “These areas are considered dangerous combat zones.”
Avichay Adraee, a spokesman for the Israeli military, said it has expanded the so-called humanitarian zone in southern Gaza, urging people to head there. The zone includes sprawling tent camps where hundreds of thousands of people have already sought refuge, and Israel has carried out strikes inside it against what it says are fighters sheltering among civilians.