UNIFIL vote postponed, air traffic controller shortage, Lebanese amid Gabon coup: Everything you need to know to start your Thursday

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The United Nations Security Council postponed a vote to renew the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL)’s mandate amid disagreements on a proposal by Lebanese authorities to restrict peacekeepers’ mobility without Lebanese Army authorization, a diplomatic source told L’Orient Today. The UN confirmed that the meeting was postponed but did not give a reason why. If a resolution is not adopted today, when UNIFIL’s annual mandate expires, it will be extended in its current form “for a month or two while the problem is resolved,” the same source said. Lebanese authorities are vying for the removal of Article 16, which allows peacekeepers to carry out their mission in southern Lebanon “independently” and “without prior authorization” from the Lebanese Army. Earlier this month, a UNIFIL source told L’Orient Today that they “have never stopped cooperating with the Lebanese Army.” In a Monday speech, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah opposed Article 16, dubbing it a “mistake” and an “attack on [Lebanese] sovereignty.”

US envoy Amos Hochstein, who mediated the indirect Lebanese-Israeli maritime border deal, returned to Beirut yesterday for a series of follow-up meetings after offshore hydrocarbon exploration drilling began last week. Hochstein met with Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri and caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati on the first day of a visit that intends, according to the US Embassy in Lebanon, “to follow-up on the historic October 2022 Maritime Boundary Agreement.” While an embassy spokesperson declined to comment to L’Orient Today on the envoy’s agenda, local media claimed he could broach the subject of the land border between Lebanon and Israel. Since the start of the year, incidents have proliferated near the southern Lebanese border, including rocket crossfire and the use of non-lethal weapons targeting Lebanese protesters, an MP and Hezbollah members. Both Lebanon and Israel filed complaints against each other with the UN this year.

The UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) said it needs over $15.4 million for the Ain al-Hilweh Palestinian refugee camp in the wake of late July clashes that killed at least 13 people and displaced hundreds of families. UNRWA announced payments to cover urgent shelter needs for 250 families affected by the clashes, who have repeatedly protested over recent weeks to demand reparation payments. The refugee body, facing chronic budget deficits, appealed for $15,467,309, more than two-thirds of which would go towards “cash assistance for conflict-affected Palestinian refugees.” The remainder is intended to cover access to education, infrastructure rehabilitation and debris removal. Ain al-Hilweh hosts around 80,000 of the country’s 250,000 Palestinian refugees.

“Lebanese nationals [in Gabon] are not in danger” from a military coup targeting the central African country’s president, Gabon-based journalist Ali Katour told L'Orient Today. The editor-in-chief of the news website Al-Jalia Online [The Online Diaspora] claimed that his estimate of “1,000 to 1,500 [Lebanese nationals] … are located in regions that, for the moment, remain stable.” Yesterday, rebel military personnel announced they had placed President Ali Bongo Ondimba on house arrest shortly after his re-election after 14 years in power, AFP reported. Kattour added that he was “in close communication with the Lebanese government” to facilitate evacuation if the need should arise, noting that there was, as of yet, no immediate danger to compel a repatriation order.

Beirut international airport officials, facing a shortage of air traffic controllers, reportedly agreed to temporarily appoint additional controllers until new recruits are operational. Air traffic controllers confirmed they are abandoning plans to limit working hours to 13 hours a day as of Sept. 5, as announced in a press release issued last Thursday. Director general of civil aviation Fadi el-Hassan, at the time, confirmed to L’Orient Today that the Beirut airport would remain operational 24 hours a day. Two aviation safety groups warned that “air traffic control staff shortage is a serious safety issue, which could have critical repercussions for aviation in Lebanon” in an audit report of the airport seen on Aug. 18 by L’Orient Today. The Al-Markaziya news agency claimed that only 13 of the 90 air traffic control positions were occupied, which could not be independently confirmed by L’Orient Today. Air traffic controllers' recruitment has been blocked for years due to political tensions over quotas for each religious sect.

Amnesty International called on Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen to reveal the fate of people missing in decades of war and unrest to mark International Day for the Disappeared, AFP reported. Citing official figures, Amnesty estimated that 17,415 people disappeared during the Lebanese Civil War, placing the country among the four states described by Amnesty MENA Regional Director Aya Majzoub as having “a very large population of missing and disappeared people.” MPs from the Lebanese Forces, the Kataeb Party, the Democratic Gathering, the Renewal Movement and several independent MPs signed a petition calling on the United Nations to include “missing Lebanese” in their investigation of Syrian prisons. Earlier this year, Lebanon abstained from voting on a UN general assembly resolution to create an independent institution to “clarify” the fate of the thousands of people who have gone missing in Syria since the start of the war in 2011

In case you missed it, here’s our must-read story from yesterday: “Rabah Noujaim, Lebanon’s other World Cup representative”

Compiled by Abbas Mahfouz