Egypt Insists on Withdrawal of Mercenaries from Libya

Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry meets with UN Special Envoy to Libya Abdoulaye Bathily in Cairo. (Egyptian Foreign Ministry)
Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry meets with UN Special Envoy to Libya Abdoulaye Bathily in Cairo. (Egyptian Foreign Ministry)
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Egypt Insists on Withdrawal of Mercenaries from Libya

Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry meets with UN Special Envoy to Libya Abdoulaye Bathily in Cairo. (Egyptian Foreign Ministry)
Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry meets with UN Special Envoy to Libya Abdoulaye Bathily in Cairo. (Egyptian Foreign Ministry)

Cairo hosted on Monday meetings with Libyan officials, including parliament Speaker Aguila Saleh. The UN Special Envoy to Libya, Abdoulaye Bathily, also met Sameh Shoukry, the Egyptian Foreign Minister.

Egypt reiterated its demand for the withdrawal of mercenaries and foreign forces from Libya.

Secretary General of the Arab League Ahmed Aboul Gheit met with Saleh to discuss challenges facing the Libyan political process and solutions to the ongoing crisis.

After the meeting, Saleh said holding Libyan elections required several measures, but hoped the Constitutional Committee would complete its tasks soon. He also voiced optimism towards the Committee finding consensus on sovereign institutions.

Saleh said the executive authority represented in the government of Abdulhamid al-Dbeibah had been tasked with specific duties to complete within a deadline, but it failed.

He called on the UN envoy, Bathily, to invite the Constitutional Base Committee, formed by the parliament and the High Council of State, to meet.

The speaker also stressed that the absence of a UN envoy during the recent period, after the resignation of Stephanie Williams, hindered the completion of the constitutional foundation because the meeting of the committee must be held under the auspices of the UN.

A new round of negotiations on the “constitutional track” between Saleh and the head of the High Council of State, Khaled al-Mishri, will start in Cairo with the presence of Bathily, sources reported.

Saleh and Mishri did not announce in advance that either of them would meet in Cairo.

However, council members talked about a meeting aimed at completing the discussion on unifying the executive authority, filling sovereign positions, and providing a constitutional basis for postponed presidential and parliamentary elections.

Shoukry stressed “the importance of the UN role in supporting the political and constitutional processes, legal frameworks and encouraging Libyan dialogue.”

The FM added that the implementation of standing agreements and legal mandates requires first the application of UN and international decisions regarding the withdrawal all foreign forces and mercenaries from Libya.

The pullout, according to Shoukry, needs to be complete within a certain timeline.



Trump Sees ‘Progress’ on Gaza, Raising Hopes for Ceasefire

Israeli military vehicles maneuver inside the Gaza strip, as seen from Israel, June 25, 2025. (Reuters)
Israeli military vehicles maneuver inside the Gaza strip, as seen from Israel, June 25, 2025. (Reuters)
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Trump Sees ‘Progress’ on Gaza, Raising Hopes for Ceasefire

Israeli military vehicles maneuver inside the Gaza strip, as seen from Israel, June 25, 2025. (Reuters)
Israeli military vehicles maneuver inside the Gaza strip, as seen from Israel, June 25, 2025. (Reuters)

US President Donald Trump said Wednesday that progress was being made to end the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, as a new ceasefire push began more than 20 months since the start of the conflict.

"I think great progress is being made on Gaza," Trump told reporters, adding that his special envoy Steve Witkoff had told him: "Gaza is very close."

He linked his optimism about imminent "very good news" to a ceasefire agreed on Tuesday between Israel and Hamas's backer Iran to end their 12-day war.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu faces growing calls from opposition politicians, relatives of hostages being held in Gaza and even members of his ruling coalition to bring an end to the fighting, triggered by Palestinian group Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack.

Key mediator Qatar announced Tuesday that it would launch a new push for a ceasefire, with Hamas on Wednesday saying talks had stepped up.

"Our communications with the brother mediators in Egypt and Qatar have not stopped and have intensified in recent hours," Hamas official Taher al-Nunu told AFP.

He cautioned, however, that the group had "not yet received any new proposals" to end the war.

The Israeli government declined to comment on any new ceasefire talks beyond saying that efforts to return Israeli hostages in Gaza were ongoing "on the battlefield and via negotiations".

- 'No clear purpose' -

Israel sent forces into Gaza to root out Iran-linked Hamas and rescue hostages after the group's October 2023 attack, which resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official figures.

Israel's military campaign has killed at least 56,156 people, also mostly civilians, according to the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza. The United Nations considers its figures reliable.

In one of the war's deadliest incidents for the Israeli army, it said seven of its soldiers were killed on Tuesday in southern Gaza, taking its overall losses in the territory to 441.

The latest losses led to rare criticism of the war effort by the leader of the ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism party, a partner in Netanyahu's coalition government.

"I still don't understand why we are fighting there... Soldiers are getting killed all the time," lawmaker Moshe Gafni told a hearing in the Israeli parliament on Wednesday.

The slain soldiers were from the Israeli combat engineering corps and were conducting a reconnaissance mission in the Khan Younis area when their vehicle was targeted with an explosive device, according to a military statement.

At the funeral of 20-year-old Staff Sergeant Ronel Ben-Moshe in Rehovot south of Tel Aviv on Wednesday, inconsolable loved ones sobbed alongside young soldiers in uniform.

One former comrade who served with Ben-Moshe in Gaza told AFP of the strain the war was putting on soldiers, saying it was time for it to end.

"Me, I was unable to complete my military service. I was so bad off mentally that I was demobilized," said the former soldier, who gave his name only as Ariel.

"I have seen so many kids like me die. It's time for it to stop."

The Hostages and Missing Families Forum, the main group representing relatives of captives held in Gaza, endorsed the call to end the war.

"The war in Gaza has run its course, it is being conducted with no clear purpose and no concrete plan," the group said in a statement.

Of the 251 hostages seized by Palestinian gunmen during the Hamas attack, 49 are still held in Gaza, including 27 the Israeli military says are dead.

Human rights groups say Gaza and its population of more than two million face famine-like conditions due to Israeli restrictions, with near-daily deaths of people queuing for food aid.

- Gunfire near aid site -

Gaza's civil defense agency said Wednesday that Israeli fire killed another 35 people, including six who were waiting for aid.

Civil defense spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP that a crowd of aid-seekers was hit by Israeli "bullets and tank shells" in an area of central Gaza where Palestinians have gathered each night in the hope of collecting rations.

Contacted by AFP, the Israeli military said it was "not aware of any incident this morning with casualties in the central Gaza Strip".

The United Nations on Tuesday condemned the "weaponization of food" in Gaza, and slammed a US- and Israeli-backed body that has largely replaced established humanitarian organizations there.

The privately run Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) was brought into the Palestinian territory at the end of May, but its operations have been marred by chaotic scenes, deaths and neutrality concerns.

The GHF has denied that deadly incidents have occurred in the immediate vicinity of its aid points.

The Gaza health ministry says that since late May, nearly 550 people have been killed near aid centers while seeking scarce supplies.