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Arab World

US Urges Houthis to Listen to Appeals for Peace in Yemen

The remains of a Houthi drone that was downed by the Yemeni military in Shabwa on Thursday. (Yemeni military media)
The remains of a Houthi drone that was downed by the Yemeni military in Shabwa on Thursday. (Yemeni military media)
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US Urges Houthis to Listen to Appeals for Peace in Yemen

The remains of a Houthi drone that was downed by the Yemeni military in Shabwa on Thursday. (Yemeni military media)
The remains of a Houthi drone that was downed by the Yemeni military in Shabwa on Thursday. (Yemeni military media)

Washington reiterated its call on the Iran-backed Houthi militias to choose peace and extend and expand the nationwide truce in Yemen.

US Special Envoy for Yemen Tim Lenderking kicked off a visit to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates on November 2 to support efforts to renew and expand the UN-mediated truce in Yemen.

“We remind the Houthis that the world is watching their actions and urge them to cooperate with the UN and listen to Yemeni appeals for peace,” said a State Department statement.

“The only path forward to ending eight years of destructive war is through a durable ceasefire and political settlement that allows Yemenis to determine the future of their country.”

Meanwhile, the United Nations accused the Houthis of committing war crimes in Yemen since the expiry of the truce on October 2.

The UN human rights office said Friday it has verified three incidents of shelling in government controlled-areas that killed a boy and a man and wounded others as well as three incidents of sniper shootings, attributing the attacks to the Houthis.

“We are gravely concerned for the safety and security of civilians,” said Jeremy Laurence, a spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk.

“The deliberate targeting of civilians and civilian objects is prohibited by international law and constitutes a war crime.”

A UN spokesperson told the same Geneva briefing on Friday that efforts were continuing to revive the truce deal.

Official Yemeni sources confirmed on Friday that five civilians, including two children and a woman, were wounded in Houthi shelling south and west of Taiz city.

The Houthis, meanwhile, questioned Washington’s call for peace, accusing it of impeding peace efforts and “always siding with war.”

UN envoy to Yemen Hans Grundberg had recently completed a tour of the region. He met with Houthi officials in Oman. His office did not release a statement on the outcomes of his trip.

The envoy had made proposals to expand and extend the truce to which the government had agreed to.

The Houthis, however, rejected the extension because they made additional demands with the aim of making economic and political gains.

Govt commitment

Chairman of the Presidential Leadership Council Dr. Rashad al-Alimi, meanwhile, met in Riyadh with US Ambassador Steven Fagin to discuss the latest developments in Yemen and the impact of the Houthi escalation and their obstruction of the extension of the truce.

Alimi highlighted the council’s backing of Grundberg’s efforts to extend the truce out of its keenness on bolstering peace opportunities and averting more destruction in the country, reported the Saba news agency.

He stressed that the council will always positively approach everything that favors the people throughout Yemen.

The world is more aware of the danger the Houthis pose in the region and world, he remarked. It is aware that they are not serious about ending the suffering of the Yemeni people, as demonstrated in their obstruction of peace efforts.

Alimi called on the international community to maintain its stance in condemning the Houthi escalation and intransigence.

It must exert more pressure on the militias to make them join peace efforts, he added, stressing that the government is committed to protecting the Yemeni people, official sources quoted him as saying.

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Arab World

French Judges Probe War Crimes Complaint against Israeli Army in Lebanon

File: Israeli heavy machinery bulldozes houses in Mansouri, as seen from Hinniyeh, Southern Lebanon, September 19, 2026. (Reuters)
File: Israeli heavy machinery bulldozes houses in Mansouri, as seen from Hinniyeh, Southern Lebanon, September 19, 2026. (Reuters)
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French Judges Probe War Crimes Complaint against Israeli Army in Lebanon

File: Israeli heavy machinery bulldozes houses in Mansouri, as seen from Hinniyeh, Southern Lebanon, September 19, 2026. (Reuters)
File: Israeli heavy machinery bulldozes houses in Mansouri, as seen from Hinniyeh, Southern Lebanon, September 19, 2026. (Reuters)

France has opened a judicial investigation into a war crimes complaint over an Israeli strike on a residential building in Lebanon, a lawyer told AFP on Tuesday.

French-Lebanese artist Ali Cherri, whose parents were killed in the Beirut strike in 2024, filed the complaint as a civil party this year with the International Federation for Human Rights, Cherri's lawyer Clemence Bectarte explained.

The crimes against humanity unit of the Paris Judicial Court has appointed two investigating judges to the case, she added, hailing the move as "a first".

Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, an ally of Palestinian militants Hamas, opened a front against neighboring Israel at the start of the Gaza war after Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, 2023.

The hostilities, which escalated into open war in September 2024, have left more than 4,000 dead in Lebanon and forced more than a million people to flee.

Seven civilians, including Cherri's father and mother, aged 87 and 77, were killed in the bombing of their 12-storey apartment building in central Beirut on November 26, 2024, according to the complaint seen by AFP. Three floors were destroyed.

The strike occurred "just a few hours before the ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hezbollah came into effect," the complaint stated, citing detailed research by Amnesty International and Forensic Architecture into the incident.

AFP has reached out to the Israeli military for comment.

Cherri told AFP he had taken legal action "for the dignity of all civilian victims".

"For nearly two years, I have been fighting... to ensure that the Israeli bombing that killed my parents and five other civilians does not go unpunished," he said.

"What happened to my parents is not an isolated case... I hope this investigation will help break the impunity enjoyed by Israeli officials responsible for attacks against civilians in Lebanon and Palestine," he added.

- Several investigations underway -

While the judicial investigation marks a first over alleged war crimes by Israeli forces in Lebanon, other cases are pending.

French-Lebanese man Mohamad H., represented by lawyer Emmanuel Daoud, has sought action after losing his mother, sister, and two nephews in strikes on the southern city of Tyre during the night of April 16-17.

In another case, a French entrepreneur born in Lebanon has accused the Israeli army of uprooting 600-century-old olive trees belonging to his family in a village in southern Lebanon.

France's National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor's Office (PNAT), which handles war crimes, has opened an investigation into allegations of torture and war crimes related to the Israeli forces' interception of humanitarian flotillas bound for Gaza in 2025 and 2026.

The PNAT also asked a Paris judge to open a war crimes investigation into the deaths of two French children in an Israeli bombing in Gaza in October 2023, while ruling out charges of genocide and crimes against humanity, according to sources close to the case.

Arab World

Sudan Files Complaint Against Ethiopia at UN Security Council Over Drone Attacks

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres meets Sudanese Foreign Minister Mohieddin Salem in New York on September 24 (UN). 
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres meets Sudanese Foreign Minister Mohieddin Salem in New York on September 24 (UN). 
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Sudan Files Complaint Against Ethiopia at UN Security Council Over Drone Attacks

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres meets Sudanese Foreign Minister Mohieddin Salem in New York on September 24 (UN). 
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres meets Sudanese Foreign Minister Mohieddin Salem in New York on September 24 (UN). 

Sudan has filed complaints against Ethiopia with the UN Security Council and the African Union Peace and Security Council over what Khartoum described as attacks on civilian facilities by drones launched from Ethiopian territory, according to a statement from the Sudanese Foreign Ministry.

Khartoum accuses Addis Ababa of siding with the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which have been fighting the Sudanese army for more than three years, leaving the country divided into areas controlled by the rival forces.

Ethiopia, for its part, accuses Sudan of supporting rebels in its Tigray region.

The attacks exchanged between the two sides have fueled unprecedented tensions between the neighboring countries, raising fears that Sudan’s war could spill across its borders.

Sudan’s Foreign Ministry declared that “the terrorist militia’s use of Ethiopian territory to target Sudanese territory constitutes a hostile act that places Ethiopia before international law.”

Sudan’s Sovereignty Council, headed by army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, had previously reported that more than 180 drones launched from Ethiopian territory had attacked Sudan this year.

According to a council report, the attacks killed or wounded around 500 civilians, striking residential areas, hospitals, power stations and fuel facilities.

Both sides in Sudan’s war rely heavily on drones, with direct confrontations declining as aerial attacks intensify in the country’s west and south.

The United Nations has warned of an increase in drone attacks, which have killed more than 1,100 people since the beginning of the year, including more than 300 in the past month alone.

The war, now in its fourth year, has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced millions within Sudan and beyond its borders, while famine has spread across several areas.

Recent attacks on power stations in army-controlled areas have caused widespread electricity outages in Khartoum, Al-Jazira, White Nile and Gedaref states.

Reports indicated that around 15 power stations were targeted between October 20 and November 1, while the Emergency Lawyers group announced on Sunday that 15 stations had been targeted in October alone.

Arab World

Lebanese Army Rejects Direct Coordination with Israel Before Withdrawal from South

The entrance to the village of Zawtar al-Gharbiyeh in South Lebanon as the Lebanese Army deployed following the withdrawal of Israeli forces on July 21, 2026. (Reuters)
The entrance to the village of Zawtar al-Gharbiyeh in South Lebanon as the Lebanese Army deployed following the withdrawal of Israeli forces on July 21, 2026. (Reuters)
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Lebanese Army Rejects Direct Coordination with Israel Before Withdrawal from South

The entrance to the village of Zawtar al-Gharbiyeh in South Lebanon as the Lebanese Army deployed following the withdrawal of Israeli forces on July 21, 2026. (Reuters)
The entrance to the village of Zawtar al-Gharbiyeh in South Lebanon as the Lebanese Army deployed following the withdrawal of Israeli forces on July 21, 2026. (Reuters)

The Lebanese Army has rejected Israeli demands for direct military coordination while Israeli forces continue to occupy Lebanese territory, fearing the move could undermine negotiations and draw the military into domestic political disputes.

The army wants to preserve the trust it has built with communities in South Lebanon, even as it cracks down on gunmen and weapons traffickers and expands its deployment in areas outside Israeli control.

Washington has conveyed Israel’s demand for direct coordination between the two armies, which would replace the existing US-mediated mechanism, the Military Coordination Group for Lebanon (MCG4L).

The group oversees implementation of the “framework agreement”, coordination arrangements and assistance with military deployments, beginning in designated pilot areas.

Israel repeated its demand during the eighth round of military-only talks in Tampa, Florida.

President Joseph Aoun backs the army’s refusal. Visitors to the president told Asharq Al-Awsat that he had personally instructed the military not to establish direct contact with Israeli forces.

“It is still far too early to discuss such a step,” Aoun told his visitors. “Under the current circumstances, direct communication is impossible while the Israeli army continues to occupy our territory and attack it every day.”

Indirect coordination

Sources familiar with contacts between the army and Lebanon’s political leadership explained that the military insists coordination with Israel remain indirect, either through the US military or the United Nations, as under previous UN-chaired tripartite and five-party committees.

The army wants an international witness to any discussions, particularly after what the sources described as negative experiences with Israel.

They cited Israel’s refusal to acknowledge the Lebanese Army’s progress in implementing the first phase of the government’s plan to bring weapons under exclusive state control south of the Litani River before fighting resumed on March 2.

Political and domestic concerns

The army’s position also reflects Israel’s continued occupation of Lebanese territory and its refusal to withdraw, halt attacks or offer political concessions that could strengthen Beirut’s negotiating position, according to the sources.

They stressed that the military does not oppose negotiations and has participated in US-mediated talks in Rome and the United States under the framework agreement.

But the army is determined to avoid becoming a target of domestic political disputes over direct negotiations with Israel.

“The military wants to preserve its standing as a national institution trusted across Lebanon’s political and sectarian divides,” the sources explained.

They warned that “direct coordination could expose the army to criticism whenever Israeli forces carried out attacks or violations, weakening public confidence in the institution.”

“Such divisions could also obstruct its mission to implement Cabinet decisions on bringing all weapons under state control and extending government authority across Lebanese territory.”

US praise

The sources reported that the Lebanese Army had faced no opposition from residents south of the Litani River while implementing the first phase of the government’s weapons-control plan.

It collected 2.7 million weapons and pieces of ammunition without coordinating with any domestic party, including Hezbollah, they noted.

The army also pursued and arrested gunmen, people who opened fire and those transporting weapons, while maintaining local support.

US Central Command praised its operations and recognized the difficulties of working in heavily damaged areas, according to the sources.

These included clearing roads, restoring basic living conditions and helping residents return to their villages, particularly in designated pilot areas.

The sources highlighted US military support for the army’s civil-military operations, which have enabled it to carry out its mission without confrontation with local communities.