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Egypt, China Stress Importance of an Immediate Ceasefire in Gaza

Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing welcomes his Egyptian counterpart, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, in Beijing on Wednesday (Egyptian Presidency)
Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing welcomes his Egyptian counterpart, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, in Beijing on Wednesday (Egyptian Presidency)
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Egypt, China Stress Importance of an Immediate Ceasefire in Gaza

Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing welcomes his Egyptian counterpart, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, in Beijing on Wednesday (Egyptian Presidency)
Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing welcomes his Egyptian counterpart, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, in Beijing on Wednesday (Egyptian Presidency)

Egypt and China on Wednesday agreed on the crucial importance of reaching an urgent and immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, and rejected any forced displacement of the Palestinians outside their land.
During talks with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping in Beijing, President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi affirmed that the implementation of the two-state solution is the fundamental guarantor to restore stability and establish peace and security in the region.
China’s President received the Egyptian President at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, where an official reception ceremony was held, according to Egyptian presidential spokesman Ahmed Fahmy.
The ceremony was followed by extensive talks focusing on ways to cultivate closer bilateral relations.
The two presidents exchanged views on regional and international developments. In this regard, the Chinese president lauded Cairo’s pivotal role and unyielding efforts to reach calm and ensure the delivery of desperately-needed humanitarian aid.
Sisi then emphasized the urgent and imperative need to end the war in Gaza, underscoring the gravity of the Israeli military operations in the Palestinian city of Rafah and their severe humanitarian, security and political consequences.
Egypt repeatedly expresses its concerns about the devastating humanitarian impact of the Israeli military operations in Rafah on over 1.4 million Palestinians and the broader implications for regional peace and stability.
Cairo has called on Israel to open all land crossings between Israel and Gaza.
The Sisi-Xi Jinping summit discussed the situation in the African continent and ways to forge closer cooperation between the two countries. Sisi was keen on affirming that the utmost priority is placed on safeguarding Egypt’s water security.
Since 2011, Ethiopia has been building the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) on the Blue Nile tributary. Addis Ababa claims the dam's primary purpose is electricity production to relieve its acute energy shortage.
But Cairo and Khartoum fear that the GERD will impact their share of the Nile waters. They have been demanding that Ethiopia join them in signing a binding legal agreement that manages the filling and operation of the dam.
Egypt has lately called on Ethiopia to submit impact technical studies of the dam. It also accused Addis Ababa of taking unilateral measures that contribute to tension and instability in the region.
Last December, Egypt announced that four-month of revived negotiations over GERD had failed to yield any results.
In Beijing, Sisi and Xi Jinping witnessed the signing ceremony of a number of cooperation agreements, including the joint development plan of the “Belt and Road” Initiative and strengthening collaboration in technological innovation and IT as well as a multitude of other areas of cooperation.
The Egyptian president's visit to the Chinese capital is his eighth in the last ten years.
The Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics (CAPMAS) has revealed that the trade exchange between Egypt and China amounted to $13.9 billion in 2023, compared to $16.6 billion in 2022.
In Beijing, Sisi also met on Wednesday the Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress of China, Zhao Leji.
The two officials underscored the remarkable momentum the Egyptian-Chinese relations have gained across all fronts, materializing in the form of key cooperation projects and programs between the two countries.
The two sides valued the distinguished relations between their parliaments and resulted in the formation of the Egyptian-Chinese Parliamentary Friendship Group.
The chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress affirmed that his country holds in high esteem its historical relations with Egypt, emphasizing China's keenness to consolidate cooperation.
Leji also valued Egypt's pivotal role both internationally and regionally, particularly its efforts to advance peace and stability in the Middle East, in addition to its steady progress in achieving national development.
Sisi then visited the Monument of the Unknown Soldier in Tiananmen Square in the Chinese capital, Beijing, where he laid a wreath on the memorial.
Meanwhile, the Secretary General of the Arab League, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, praised the “historic ties between the Arab countries and China, based on mutual trust and respect.”
This came during his meeting, on Wednesday, with the Chinese Vice President, Han Zheng, on the sidelines of the visit of the AL Secretary-General to Beijing to attend the tenth session of the ministerial meeting of the China-Arab States Cooperation Forum which will be held on Thursday in the Chinese capital.

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Arab World

Lebanon PM Pledges Reconstruction on Visit to Ruined Border Towns

This handout picture released by the Lebanese Government Press Office shows Lebanon's Prime Minister Nawaf Salam being showered with confetti as he is received by locals during a tour in the heavily-damaged southern village of Dhayra near the border with Israel on February 7, 2026. (Lebanese Government Press Office / AFP)
This handout picture released by the Lebanese Government Press Office shows Lebanon's Prime Minister Nawaf Salam being showered with confetti as he is received by locals during a tour in the heavily-damaged southern village of Dhayra near the border with Israel on February 7, 2026. (Lebanese Government Press Office / AFP)
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Lebanon PM Pledges Reconstruction on Visit to Ruined Border Towns

This handout picture released by the Lebanese Government Press Office shows Lebanon's Prime Minister Nawaf Salam being showered with confetti as he is received by locals during a tour in the heavily-damaged southern village of Dhayra near the border with Israel on February 7, 2026. (Lebanese Government Press Office / AFP)
This handout picture released by the Lebanese Government Press Office shows Lebanon's Prime Minister Nawaf Salam being showered with confetti as he is received by locals during a tour in the heavily-damaged southern village of Dhayra near the border with Israel on February 7, 2026. (Lebanese Government Press Office / AFP)

Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam visited heavily damaged towns near the Israeli border on Saturday, pledging reconstruction.

It was his first trip to the southern border area since the army said it finished disarming Hezbollah there, in January.

Swathes of south Lebanon's border areas remain in ruins and largely deserted more than a year after a US-brokered November 2024 ceasefire sought to end hostilities between Israel and the Iran-backed group.

Lebanon's government has committed to disarming Hezbollah, and the army last month said it had completed the first phase of its plan to do so, covering the area between the Litani River and the Israeli border about 30 kilometers (20 miles) further south.

Visiting Tayr Harfa, around three kilometers from the border, and nearby Yarine, Salam said frontier towns and villages had suffered "a true catastrophe".

He vowed authorities would begin key projects including restoring roads, communications networks and water in the two towns.

Locals gathered on the rubble of buildings to greet Salam and the delegation of accompanying officials in nearby Dhayra, some waving Lebanese flags.

In a meeting in Bint Jbeil, further east, with officials including lawmakers from Hezbollah and its ally the Amal movement, Salam said authorities would "rehabilitate 32 kilometers of roads, reconnect the severed communications network, repair water infrastructure" and power lines in the district.

Last year, the World Bank announced it had approved $250 million to support Lebanon's post-war reconstruction, after estimating that it would cost around $11 billion in total.

Salam said funds including from the World Bank would be used for the reconstruction and rehabilitation projects.

The second phase of the government's disarmament plan for Hezbollah concerns the area between the Litani and the Awali rivers, around 40 kilometers south of Beirut.

Israel, which accuses Hezbollah of rearming, has criticized the army's progress as insufficient, while Hezbollah has rejected calls to surrender its weapons.

Despite the truce, Israel has kept up regular strikes on what it usually says are Hezbollah targets and maintains troops in five south Lebanon areas.

Lebanese officials have accused Israel of seeking to prevent reconstruction in the heavily damaged south with repeated strikes on bulldozers, excavators and prefabricated houses.

Visiting French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot on Friday said the reform of Lebanon's banking system needed to precede international funding for reconstruction efforts.

The French diplomat met Lebanon's army chief Rodolphe Haykal on Saturday, the military said.

Arab World

Over 2,200 ISIS Detainees Transferred to Iraq from Syria, Says Iraqi Official

One of the American buses transporting ISIS fighters, according to a security source from the Syrian Democratic Forces, heads from Syria towards Iraq, in Qamishli, Syria, February 7, 2026. (Reuters)
One of the American buses transporting ISIS fighters, according to a security source from the Syrian Democratic Forces, heads from Syria towards Iraq, in Qamishli, Syria, February 7, 2026. (Reuters)
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Over 2,200 ISIS Detainees Transferred to Iraq from Syria, Says Iraqi Official

One of the American buses transporting ISIS fighters, according to a security source from the Syrian Democratic Forces, heads from Syria towards Iraq, in Qamishli, Syria, February 7, 2026. (Reuters)
One of the American buses transporting ISIS fighters, according to a security source from the Syrian Democratic Forces, heads from Syria towards Iraq, in Qamishli, Syria, February 7, 2026. (Reuters)

Iraq has so far received 2,225 ISIS group detainees, whom the US military began transferring from Syria last month, an Iraqi official told AFP on Saturday.

They are among up to 7,000 ISIS detainees whose transfer from Syria to Iraq the US Central Command (CENTCOM) announced last month, in a move it said was aimed at "ensuring that the terrorists remain in secure detention facilities".

Previously, they had been held in prisons and camps administered by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in northeast Syria.

The announcement of the transfer plan last month came after US envoy to Syria Tom Barrack declared that the SDF's role in confronting ISIS had come to an end.

Saad Maan, head of the security information cell attached to the Iraqi prime minister's office, told AFP on Saturday that "Iraq has received 2,225 terrorists from the Syrian side by land and air, in coordination with the international coalition", which Washington has led since 2014 to fight IS.

He said they are being held in "strict, regular detention centers".

A Kurdish military source confirmed to AFP the "continued transfer of ISIS detainees from Syria to Iraq under the protection of the international coalition".

On Saturday, an AFP photographer near the Kurdish-majority city of Qamishli in northeastern Syria saw a US military convoy and 11 buses with tinted windows.

- Iraq calls for repatriation -

ISIS seized swathes of northern and western Iraq starting in 2014, until Iraqi forces, backed by the international coalition, managed to defeat it in 2017.

Iraq is still recovering from the severe abuses committed by the extremists.

In recent years, Iraqi courts have issued death and life sentences against those convicted of terrorism offences.

Thousands of Iraqis and foreign nationals convicted of membership in the group are incarcerated in Iraqi prisons.

On Monday, the Iraqi judiciary announced it had begun investigative procedures involving 1,387 detainees it received as part of the US military's operation.

In a statement to the Iraqi News Agency on Saturday, Maan said "the established principle is to try all those involved in crimes against Iraqis and those belonging to the terrorist ISIS organization before the competent Iraqi courts".

Among the detainees being transferred to Iraq are Syrians, Iraqis, Europeans and holders of other nationalities, according to Iraqi security sources.

Iraq is calling on the concerned countries to repatriate their citizens and ensure their prosecution.

Maan noted that "the process of handing over the terrorists to their countries will begin once the legal requirements are completed".

Arab World

Drone Attack by RSF in Sudan Kills 24, Including 8 Children, Doctors’ Group Says

Displaced Sudanese wait to receive humanitarian aid at the Abu al-Naga displacement camp in the Gedaref State, some 420km east of the capital Khartoum on February 6, 2026. (AFP)
Displaced Sudanese wait to receive humanitarian aid at the Abu al-Naga displacement camp in the Gedaref State, some 420km east of the capital Khartoum on February 6, 2026. (AFP)
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Drone Attack by RSF in Sudan Kills 24, Including 8 Children, Doctors’ Group Says

Displaced Sudanese wait to receive humanitarian aid at the Abu al-Naga displacement camp in the Gedaref State, some 420km east of the capital Khartoum on February 6, 2026. (AFP)
Displaced Sudanese wait to receive humanitarian aid at the Abu al-Naga displacement camp in the Gedaref State, some 420km east of the capital Khartoum on February 6, 2026. (AFP)

A drone attack by a notorious paramilitary group hit a vehicle carrying displaced families in central Sudan Saturday, killing at least 24 people, including eight children, a doctors’ group said.

The attack by the Rapid Support Forces occurred close to the city of Rahad in North Kordofan province, said the Sudan Doctors Network, which tracks the country’s ongoing war.

The vehicle transported displaced people who fled fighting in the Dubeiker area of North Kordofan, the doctors’ group said in a statement. Among the dead children were two infants, the group said.

The doctors’ group urged the international community and rights organizations to “take immediate action to protect civilians and hold the RSF leadership directly accountable for these violations.”

There was no immediate comment from the RSF, which has been at war against the Sudanese military for control of the country for about three years.

Sudan plunged into chaos in April 2023 when a power struggle between the military and the RSF exploded into open fighting in the capital, Khartoum, and elsewhere in the country.

The devastating war has killed more than 40,000 people, according to UN figures, but aid groups say that is an undercount and the true number could be many times higher.

It created the world’s largest humanitarian crisis with over 14 million people forced to flee their homes. It fueled disease outbreaks and pushed parts of the country into famine.