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Israeli Security Delegation Meets Military Leaders in Sudan

People hold Sudanese flags during a protest in Khartoum, Sudan (Reuters)
People hold Sudanese flags during a protest in Khartoum, Sudan (Reuters)
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Israeli Security Delegation Meets Military Leaders in Sudan

People hold Sudanese flags during a protest in Khartoum, Sudan (Reuters)
People hold Sudanese flags during a protest in Khartoum, Sudan (Reuters)

A high-ranking official Israeli security delegation arrived in Khartoum Wednesday to meet with Sudanese military and security leaders.

The visit is part of a series of meetings between Khartoum and Tel Aviv since the top general, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, met with former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Entebbe, Uganda, in February 2020.

Sudan signed the Abrahamic Accords on January 6, 2021, and normalized relations with Israel.

Sources in Khartoum reported that the delegation is expected to hold meetings with Burhan, his deputy, Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, and the chief of General Intelligence, Ahmed Ibrahim Mufaddal.

Sudanese and Israeli authorities did not reveal the nature of those discussions, but a source told Asharq Al-Awsat that they were limited to the security aspects and recent developments in the country.

The Israeli public broadcaster, Kan, reported that a high-level delegation arrived from Tel Aviv for a visit that lasts hours, during which talks will be held with Sudanese military leaders.

Kan indicated that the Israeli delegation took off from Ben Gurion Airport in the morning and made a "diplomatic stopover" in Sharm el-Sheikh in Egypt before leaving for Sudan.

The Israeli Prime Minister's office did not confirm or deny the news.

The broadcaster gave brief information about the visit without specifying the names or ranks of the participants.

The last visit of an Israeli delegation to Sudan was in November, chaired by the head of the Israeli intelligence service, Mossad, according to Kan. Khartoum did not disclose the purpose of the secret visit.

Sources told Asharq Al-Awsat that a senior official in the Rapid Support Forces received the visiting delegation at Khartoum airport.

The delegation’s visit came in light of the complex political and economic situations in Sudan.

In recent weeks, Sudan has been in turmoil amid daily anti-coup protests and clashes with the security forces.

On Monday, the security forces killed seven people and wounded hundreds of others. As a result, the Forces for Freedom and Change called for two days of civil disobedience on Tuesday.

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An Israeli Strike that Killed 3 Lebanese Journalists Was Most Likely Deliberate

A destroyed journalists car is seen at the site where an Israeli airstrike hit a compound housing journalists, killing three media staffers from two different news agencies according to Lebanon's state-run National News Agency, in Hasbaya village, southeast Lebanon, Friday, Oct. 25, 2024. (AP)
A destroyed journalists car is seen at the site where an Israeli airstrike hit a compound housing journalists, killing three media staffers from two different news agencies according to Lebanon's state-run National News Agency, in Hasbaya village, southeast Lebanon, Friday, Oct. 25, 2024. (AP)
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An Israeli Strike that Killed 3 Lebanese Journalists Was Most Likely Deliberate

A destroyed journalists car is seen at the site where an Israeli airstrike hit a compound housing journalists, killing three media staffers from two different news agencies according to Lebanon's state-run National News Agency, in Hasbaya village, southeast Lebanon, Friday, Oct. 25, 2024. (AP)
A destroyed journalists car is seen at the site where an Israeli airstrike hit a compound housing journalists, killing three media staffers from two different news agencies according to Lebanon's state-run National News Agency, in Hasbaya village, southeast Lebanon, Friday, Oct. 25, 2024. (AP)

An Israeli airstrike that killed three journalists and wounded others in Lebanon last month was most likely a deliberate attack on civilians and an apparent war crime, an international human rights group said Monday.
The Oct. 25 airstrike killed three journalists as they slept at a guesthouse in southeast Lebanon in one of the deadliest attacks on the media since the Israel-Hezbollah war began 13 months ago.
Eleven other journalists have been killed and eight wounded since then, Lebanon's Health Minister Firass Abiad said.
More than 3,500 people have been killed in Lebanon, and women and children accounted for more than 900 of the dead, according to the Health Ministry. More than 1 million people have been displaced since Israeli ground troops invaded while Hezbollah has been firing thousands of rockets, drones and missiles into Israel - and drawing fierce Israeli retaliatory strikes.
Human Rights Watch determined that Israeli forces carried out the Oct. 25 attack using an air-dropped bomb equipped with a US produced Joint Direct Attack Munition, or JDAM, guidance kit.
The group said the US government should suspend weapons transfers to Israel because of the military´s repeated "unlawful attacks on civilians, for which US officials may be complicit in war crimes."
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military on the report.
The Biden administration said in May that Israel’s use of US-provided weapons in the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza likely violated international humanitarian law but that wartime conditions prevented US officials from determining that for certain in specific airstrikes.
The journalists killed in the airstrike in the southeastern town of Hasbaya were camera operator Ghassan Najjar and broadcast technician Mohammed Rida of the Beirut-based pan-Arab Al-Mayadeen TV, and camera operator Wissam Qassim, who worked for Hezbollah's Al-Manar TV.
Human Rights Watch said a munition struck the single-story building and detonated upon hitting the floor.
"Israel’s use of US arms to unlawfully attack and kill journalists away from any military target is a terrible mark on the United States as well as Israel," said Richard Weir, the senior crisis, conflict and arms researcher at Human Rights Watch.
Weir added that "the Israeli military’s previous deadly attacks on journalists without any consequences give little hope for accountability in this or future violations against the media."
Human Rights Watch said that it found remnants at the site and reviewed photographs of pieces collected by the resort owner and determined that they were consistent with a JDAM guidance kit assembled and sold by the US company Boeing.

The JDAM is affixed to air-dropped bombs and allows them to be guided to a target by using satellite coordinates, making the weapon accurate to within several meters, the group said.
In November 2023, two journalists for Al-Mayadeen TV were killed in a drone strike at their reporting spot. A month earlier, Israeli shelling in southern Lebanon killed Reuters videographer Issam Abdallah and seriously wounded other journalists from France´s international news agency Agence France-Presse and Qatar´s Al-Jazeera TV on a hilltop not far from the Israeli border.