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Hezbollah Ties Lebanon’s Political Stability to Resignation of Beirut Blast Probe Judge

A man cleans up shattered glass a day after the Tayyouneh clashes, October 15, 2021. (Reuters)
A man cleans up shattered glass a day after the Tayyouneh clashes, October 15, 2021. (Reuters)
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Hezbollah Ties Lebanon’s Political Stability to Resignation of Beirut Blast Probe Judge

A man cleans up shattered glass a day after the Tayyouneh clashes, October 15, 2021. (Reuters)
A man cleans up shattered glass a day after the Tayyouneh clashes, October 15, 2021. (Reuters)

Hezbollah tied on Saturday Lebanon’s political stability to the resignation of lead judge in the investigation of the Beirut port blast, Tarek Bitar.

Deputy leader of the Iran-backed party, Naim Qassem said Bitar “has become a real problem in Lebanon.”

The dispute has obstructed the work of the government for ten days now.

Parliamentary sources told Asharq Al-Awsat that there are no signs that it will be convening any time soon given that the dispute is not close to being resolved.

Qassem said: “We wanted a real investigator to reveal what happened at the port so that justice can prevail.”

He accused Bitar of “flagrantly politicizing the probe”, alleging that the relatives of the victims have grown suspicious of him and that he had almost caused strife in the Tayyouneh area in Beirut.

Some ten days ago, Hezbollah and its ally Amal had staged a protest against Bitar in Tayyouneh. Tensions between them and the Lebanese Forces (LF) boiled over, leading to armed clashes in the area reminiscent of the 1975-90 civil war. Seven people were killed in the fighting.

“What sort of investigator is this? He has brought us problems and crises. There can be no hope in justice coming from him,” declared Qassem.

“He is better off resigning so that stability can be restored and so people can have their justice,” he added.

He also slammed the LF over the Tayyouneh fighting, accusing it of planning the clashes beforehand as it had snipers ready to attack the peaceful protest.

“We succeeded in this confrontation because we snuffed out strife through patience and rationality,” he said, stressing that Hezbollah will follow through with the probe into the fighting so that the perpetrators are brought to justice.

Former LF MP Fadi Karam expressed his concern that the “security apparatus” could be used to suppress the opposition.

He explained that Hezbollah was using the Tayyouneh incident to divert attention from the Beirut port blast probe so that it could shirk blame from that crime.

Former President Michel Suleiman expressed concern that the judiciary was coming under pressure over the Beirut blast probe and Tayyouneh clashes.

He echoed Karam’s remarks in that the clashes were being used to divert attention from the blast investigation.

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Trump Administration Ends Some USAID Contracts Providing Lifesaving Aid across the Middle East

A USAID flag flutters outside, as the USAID building sits closed to employees after a memo was issued advising agency personnel to work remotely, in Washington, DC, US, February 3, 2025. (Reuters)
A USAID flag flutters outside, as the USAID building sits closed to employees after a memo was issued advising agency personnel to work remotely, in Washington, DC, US, February 3, 2025. (Reuters)
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Trump Administration Ends Some USAID Contracts Providing Lifesaving Aid across the Middle East

A USAID flag flutters outside, as the USAID building sits closed to employees after a memo was issued advising agency personnel to work remotely, in Washington, DC, US, February 3, 2025. (Reuters)
A USAID flag flutters outside, as the USAID building sits closed to employees after a memo was issued advising agency personnel to work remotely, in Washington, DC, US, February 3, 2025. (Reuters)

The Trump administration has notified the World Food Program and other partners that it has terminated some of the last remaining lifesaving humanitarian programs across the Middle East, a US official and a UN official told The Associated Press on Monday.

The projects were being canceled “for the convenience of the US Government” at the direction of Jeremy Lewin, a top lieutenant at Trump adviser Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency whom the Trump administration appointed to oversee and finish dismantling the US Agency for International Development, according to letters sent to USAID partners and viewed by the AP.

About 60 letters canceling contracts were sent over the past week, including for major projects with the World Food Program, the world’s largest provider of food aid, a USAID official said. An official with the United Nations in the Middle East said the World Food Program received termination letters for US-funded programs in Lebanon, Jordan and Syria.

Both officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly.

Some of the last remaining US funding for key programs in Yemen, Somalia, Afghanistan and the southern African nation of Zimbabwe also was affected, including for those providing food, water, medical care and shelter for people displaced by war, the USAID official said.

The UN official said the groups that would be hit hardest include Syrian refugees in Jordan and Lebanon. Also affected are programs supporting vulnerable Lebanese people and providing irrigation systems inside Syria, a country emerging from a brutal civil war and struggling with poverty and hunger.

In Yemen, another war-divided country that is facing one of the world’s worst humanitarian disasters, the terminated aid apparently includes food that has already arrived in distribution centers, the UN official said.

Aid officials were just learning of many of the cuts Monday and said they were struggling to understand their scope.

Another of the notices, sent Friday, abruptly pulled US funding for a program with strong support in Congress that had sent young Afghan women overseas for schooling amid Taliban prohibitions on women’s education, said an administrator for that project, which is run by Texas A&M University.

The young women would now face return to Afghanistan, where their lives would be in danger, according to that administrator, who was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The Trump administration had pledged to spare those most urgent, lifesaving programs in its cutting of aid and development programs through the State Department and USAID.

The Republican administration already has canceled thousands of USAID contracts as it dismantles USAID, which it accuses of wastefulness and of advancing liberal causes.

The newly terminated contracts were among about 900 surviving programs that Secretary of State Marco Rubio had notified Congress he intended to preserve, the USAID official said.

There was no immediate comment from the State Department.