Patriarch Al-Rai resumes mediation between Aoun and Hariri to form government

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By NAJIA HOUSSARI -- arabnews.com -- BEIRUT: Lebanese President Michel Aoun on Thursday met Christian Patriarch Bechara Boutros Al-Rai, who is unhappy with the delay in forming a government due to the conditions put forward by the president. The meeting took place as Israeli warplanes violated Lebanese airspace following a similar breach of Lebanese waters on Wednesday night, when Israeli soldiers on a gunboat fired at Lebanese fishing boats, according to the Lebanese army command. The Aoun-Al-Rai talks continued for 45 minutes. Afterwards, Aoun said that the purpose of the meeting was to wish each other happy holidays because circumstances prevented them from being at the Patriarchate at Christmas. He said, however, that they had touched on “the general conditions that are still unannounced because all that happened with us is not reported in the media, and unfortunately, everyone in the media writes as they please.”

Aoun spoke of the “possibility” of a meeting between him and the prime minister-designate, Saad Hariri, but did not specify a date for the meeting. There is information that Al-Rai was arranging a meeting between Aoun and Hariri as part of his efforts to accelerate the formation of the government. This has reached stalemate as Aoun has not yet responded to the lineup suggested by Hariri a month ago in accordance with the French initiative — that it does not include ministers affiliated with politicians in power, but rather technocrats. Hariri returned to Beirut on Thursday after spending the holidays abroad. The media bureau of the president said: “There is no truth in the information that a meeting was to be held in Bkerke between Aoun and Hariri, under the auspices of Al-Rai. The truth is that Al-Rai made a similar proposal to the president during their Thursday meeting, and Aoun did not know about it in advance.” The dispute between Hariri and the Free Patriotic Movement (FPM), which is headed by the president’s son-in-law, Gebran Bassil, escalated a few days ago when Hariri’s media office announced its rejection of the FPM bloc’s holding “others responsible for the obstacles that the movement deliberately creates” in forming a government.

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Capitol on Lockdown, Reports of Shots Fired, 1 Shot, and Protesters Roaming Building

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by newsmax.com -- Jeffrey Rubin -- The U.S. Capitol is secure once more, hours after supporters of President Donald Trump breached the historic building. The siege, which occurred as lawmakers were beginning to certify Electoral College results showing Joe Biden won the Nov. 3 election, had plunged the capital into chaos, with TV anchors likening videos of surging crowds and broken windows to those more commonly seen in authoritarian and third-world countries. It occurred not long after Trump, convinced voter fraud caused his loss to Biden, urged supporters at a rally in D.C. to oppose the ceremonial counting of the electoral votes. Though the ceremonial count, and associated protests by dozens of Republican lawmakers, were interrupted for hours, in a letter to colleagues House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said congressional leaders had decided to resume the joint session Wednesday night. They aim to do so once the Capitol is cleared for use, she said, after consultation with top lawmakers, the Pentagon, the Justice Department and Vice President Mike Pence.

By some reports, including one from the Washington Post, the surge into the Capitol led to use of tear gas, gunfire, and the death of one woman from gunshot wounds to the chest. National Guard and state troopers from Virginia have been called up, among others, to aid in restoring order. The woman was a “civilian” and officers are investigating, said Chief Robert J. Contee of the Metropolitan Police Department. She’d been pronounced dead at a local hospital, but officials had no further details on who shot her or why. There was much more detail, much of it startling, about the start of the siege. Shortly after 1 p.m. ET Wednesday hundreds of pro-Trump protesters pushed through barriers set up along the perimeter of the Capitol, bumping up against officers in full riot gear, some calling the officers "traitors" for doing their jobs, CNN said. About 90 minutes later, police said demonstrators got into the building and the doors to the House and Senate were being locked.

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Covid-19 hit Lebanese in a desperate hunt for hospital beds

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by AFP -- Beirut: When Rachelle Halabi rushed her 85-year-old father to a Beirut hospital a few days ago with Covid-19, the doctor sent them home as intensive care was full. "The ER doctor told us to go back, get him an oxygen machine and give him his treatment from home," she told AFP from the Lebanese capital. "We went with it for several days, but his condition did not improve." Halabi herself tested positive for Covid-19, one of the thousands of new cases reported in Lebanon following a holiday season where loosened restrictions let infections soar. With 192,000 reported cases and almost 1,500 deaths, Lebanon is not among the world's worst hit countries. But its infrastructure is crumbling, and a small surge in infections is enough to take its health sector to breaking point.

The health ministry has in recent weeks urged private hospitals to make more room for Covid-19 patients, but the pandemic is spreading too fast. "The rise in Covid numbers has outpaced the increase in critical beds," said Firass Abiad, the head of a major public hospital battling the virus. Lebanese Red Cross president Georges Kettaneh told AFP the service was "transporting around 100 patients in need of hospital treatment a day." Halabi said she was turned away by several hospitals, and her hunt for a bed eventually took her outside the capital, to a private hospital in the city of Zahle, in the Bekaa valley. Her father was given a bed in exchange for 15 million Lebanese pounds, equivalent to some $10,000 at the official exchange rate. "What do you do if you can't afford this amount?" she asked. Her father had already had a narrow escape earlier this year, when a mammoth blast at Beirut port in August devastated swathes of the capital.

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Lebanese social media erupts in frustration over Soleimani monument

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by arabnews.com -- LONDON: Lebanese took to social media platforms to express their discontent and frustration with the unveiling of a Qassem Soleimani monument in the Hezbollah district of Ghobeiry on Tuesday. “New Qassem Sulaimani statue in #Lebanon — with Lebanese flags in the background, useful to remind us where we are. Whats next? Sulaimani stamps?” wrote journalist Luna Safwan, who was the subject of a targeted campaign by Hezbollah last year. Another user, Wael Atallah, opposed the step, calling it “a cultural aggression being imposed on Lebanon,” which left the Lebanese people “violated and powerless.” Supporters of the Iran-backed Hezbollah unveiled the statue of the Iranian general a year after he was killed by a US drone strike in Iraq.

Hezbollah supporters gathered in a commemoration ceremony grieving the loss of Soleimani. Recent weeks have seen the installation of scores of Soleimani billboards across Hezbollah-dominated areas in the south Beirut Dahye suburbs and throughout south Lebanon. The move has fueled criticism by local Lebanese, who took to social media to protest Iran’s infringement of Lebanon’s sovereignty to try to counter Iran’s growing influence in the country. Nizar Hassan, a Lebanese researcher, said that it highlighted Hezbollah’s desperation “to make (the) late Iranian General Qassem Suleimani a local hero, despite knowing that for the majority of people in Lebanon, he simply represents a foreign power.” Another Lebanese citizen, Dalia Tarabay, tweeted a picture of the statue, saying: “The day will come when the Lebanese will tear down the statue of this terrorist and tyrant Qassem Soleimani like they have done with many other statues of tyrants before this. Until then, shame on anyone who deems this appropriate.” The erection of the statue comes soon after a top IRGC commander boasted that Lebanon owed its missile capabilities to Iran and that the country was in the front line of Iran’s fight against Israel.

Lebanese cardinal Patriarch Mar Bechara Boutros Rai urges leaders to help country avoid ‘total collapse

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By Courtney Mares -- Rome Newsroom, (CNA).- Lebanon’s Maronite patriarch has said that the country could be facing “the risk of total collapse” amid a deepening economic and political crisis. In his homily on Jan. 3, Cardinal Bechara Boutros Rai, the leader of Lebanon’s Maronite Catholics, said that Lebanon’s political leaders needed to “overcome the logic of partisan interests” and form a government to help rescue the country. Rai urged the formation of a “government with real independence, democratic and pluralistic balance, and with highly qualified ministers.” He added that Lebanon’s leaders needed to make a “responsible and courageous decision” to disrupt various internal and external interventions and “set their sights on the interest of Lebanon only.” The patriarch warned officials not to “underestimate the risk of complete collapse.” It was the second time in less than a week that the Lebanese cardinal had spoken of the risk of collapse.

In his homily on New Year’s Day, Rai said: “No one or any group of the political spectrum, whether directly or indirectly involved, has the right to hinder the formation of the government for the sake of current or future accounts and interests.” “Two months and 10 days have passed since the task to form the government was issued, while Lebanon is moving rapidly towards complete collapse and bankruptcy.” He continued: “It is truly shameful that the new year begins without the government formed and committed to work. It is also disgraceful for the unemployed to deal with the Lebanese issue as if it were one of the chess pieces of the Middle East or major countries. Let the political community remember that forming a government is its first and basic duty and the justification for its existence.”

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Iran Seeking Trump's Arrest for Death of Soleimani

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by Newsmax -- Jeffrey Rodack -- Iran has requested Interpol arrest President Donald Trump and 47 other Americans it said played a role in the death of top general Qassem Soleimani. The U.S. killed Soleimani, leader of the Revolutionary Guards' Quds Force, in Iraq on Jan. 3, 2020. Washington had accused him of masterminding attacks by Iranian-aligned militias on U.S. forces in the region. The request for Trump’s arrest was announced by Iranian judiciary spokesman Gholamhossein Esmaili on Tuesday, according to Al-Jazeera. “The Islamic Republic of Iran is very seriously following up on pursuing and punishing those who ordered and executed this crime,” Esmaili told reporters.

It is the second request Iran has made since June seeking to have Trump arrested. France-based Interpol turned down Iran’s first request, according to Al-Jazeera. The international police organization had said its constitution prevents it from undertaking “any intervention or activities of a political, military, religious, or racial character.”