Lebanese-Israeli Maritime Agreement to Be Signed within 10 Days

 09 September 2022, Lebanon, Baabda: Lebanese President Michel Aoun (R) speaks with US Senior Advisor for Energy Security Amos Hochstein during their meeting at the Presidential Palace. (Dalati & Nohra)
09 September 2022, Lebanon, Baabda: Lebanese President Michel Aoun (R) speaks with US Senior Advisor for Energy Security Amos Hochstein during their meeting at the Presidential Palace. (Dalati & Nohra)
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Lebanese-Israeli Maritime Agreement to Be Signed within 10 Days

 09 September 2022, Lebanon, Baabda: Lebanese President Michel Aoun (R) speaks with US Senior Advisor for Energy Security Amos Hochstein during their meeting at the Presidential Palace. (Dalati & Nohra)
09 September 2022, Lebanon, Baabda: Lebanese President Michel Aoun (R) speaks with US Senior Advisor for Energy Security Amos Hochstein during their meeting at the Presidential Palace. (Dalati & Nohra)

Lebanon’s deputy parliament Speaker Elias Bou Saab revealed the expected date for the completion of the demarcation settlement with Israel and the mechanism by which the agreement will be signed.

“The points that the United States has included in a letter will be sent to both Lebanon and Israel. Lebanon will respond by agreeing in writing to the message, and Israel will respond in the same way,” Bou Saab said in a television interview to be aired on Monday.

He added that the delivery of letters was likely to take place on Oct. 26 or 27 through the United Nations at Lebanon’s border area of Naqoura.

Asked about the Lebanese party that will sign the agreement letter, Bou Saab replied: “This decision is taken by the President of the Republic, who will choose the team that will head to Naqoura.”

The deputy speaker noted that the alternative to this agreement “could have been war or escalation.”

He said he believed that former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s threat to annul the agreement if he wins elections in November “is electoral talk,” adding that any breach would put US credibility at stake.

“The agreement also guarantees that there will be no provocation on the border, neither by [Hezbollah] nor any other party,” Bou Saab stressed.

Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah had praised the US proposal, even before Aoun announced Lebanon’s official approval of it.

However, the head of Hezbollah’s Loyalty to the Resistance parliamentary bloc, MP Mohammad Raad, said on Sunday: “We still don’t trust this enemy and we will never do; that’s why, we have not yet announced our position.”

Meanwhile, Hezbollah deputy Secretary-General Naim Qassem described the demarcation agreement as a “historic achievement.”

“The resistance had a great impact on securing the maritime oil and gas rights for Lebanon; it will be a historic achievement when the signing takes place... This matter would not have happened without the solidarity between the state and the resistance…” Qassem said.



Israeli Military Changes Initial Account of Gaza Aid Worker Killings

Palestinians mourn medics, who came under Israeli fire while on a rescue mission, after their bodies were recovered, according to the Red Crescent, at Nasser hospital in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip March 31, 2025. (Reuters)
Palestinians mourn medics, who came under Israeli fire while on a rescue mission, after their bodies were recovered, according to the Red Crescent, at Nasser hospital in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip March 31, 2025. (Reuters)
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Israeli Military Changes Initial Account of Gaza Aid Worker Killings

Palestinians mourn medics, who came under Israeli fire while on a rescue mission, after their bodies were recovered, according to the Red Crescent, at Nasser hospital in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip March 31, 2025. (Reuters)
Palestinians mourn medics, who came under Israeli fire while on a rescue mission, after their bodies were recovered, according to the Red Crescent, at Nasser hospital in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip March 31, 2025. (Reuters)

The Israeli military has provided new details that changed its initial account of the killing of 15 emergency workers near the southern Gaza city of Rafah last month but said investigators were still examining the evidence.

The 15 paramedics and emergency responders were shot dead on March 23 and buried in a shallow grave where their bodies were found a week later by officials from the United Nations and the Palestinian Red Crescent. Another man is still missing.

The military initially said soldiers had opened fire on vehicles that approached their position "suspiciously" in the dark without lights or markings. It said they killed nine fighters from Hamas and Islamic Jihad who were travelling in Palestinian Red Crescent vehicles.

But video recovered from the mobile phone of one of the dead men and published by the Palestinian Red Crescent showed emergency workers in their uniforms and clearly marked ambulances and fire trucks, with their lights on, being fired on by soldiers.

The only known survivor of the incident, Palestinian Red Crescent paramedic Munther Abed, also said he had seen soldiers opening fire on clearly marked emergency response vehicles.

An Israeli military official said late on Saturday the investigators were examining the video and conclusions were expected to be presented to army commanders on Sunday.

Israeli media briefed by the military reported that troops had identified at least six of the 15 dead as members of the groups. However, the official declined to provide any evidence or detail of how the identifications were made, saying he did not want to share classified information.

"According to our information, there were terrorists there but this investigation is not over," he told reporters at the briefing late on Saturday.

The UN and the Palestinian Red Cross have demanded an independent inquiry into the killing of the paramedics.

Red Crescent officials have said 17 paramedics and emergency workers from the Red Crescent, the Civil Emergency service and the UN had been dispatched to respond to reports of injuries from Israeli air strikes.

Apart from Abed, who was detained for several hours before being released, another worker is still missing.

OPENED FIRE

The military official said initial findings from the investigation showed troops had opened fire on a vehicle at around 4 a.m., killing two members of the Hamas internal security forces, and taking another prisoner, who the official said had admitted under interrogation to being in Hamas.

As time passed, several vehicles passed along the road until, at around 6 a.m., he said troops received word from aerial surveillance that a suspicious group of vehicles was approaching.

"They feel this is another incident like what happened at 4 a.m. and they opened fire," the official said.

He said aerial surveillance footage showed the troops were at some distance when they opened fire, and he denied reports that the troops handcuffed at least some of the paramedics and shot them at close range.

"It's not from close. They opened fire from afar," he said. "There's no mistreatment of the people there."

He said the soldiers had approached the group they had shot, identifying at least some of them as fighters. However, he did not explain what evidence had prompted the assessment.

"And in their eyes, they had an encounter with terrorists, that is a successful encounter with terrorists."

He said the troops had informed the UN of the incident on the same day and initially covered the bodies with camouflage netting until they could be recovered. UN officials did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.

"There was no incident where the Israeli army tried to cover up. On the contrary, they called the UN immediately."

Later, when the UN did not immediately come to take the bodies, the soldiers covered them with sand to stop animals from getting at them, the official said.

He said the vehicles were pushed out of the way by a heavy engineering vehicle to clear the road but he could not explain why the vehicles were crushed by the engineering vehicle and then buried.