As Israeli aggression in Gaza, Lebanon, and Post-Assad Syria deepens human suffering and regional instability, and amid growing international calls for ceasefires and de-escalation, Ahram Online covered the latest developments in the Middle East as they unfolded on Tuesday, 17 December.
21:20 The United States said it felt "cautious optimism" about the prospects of reaching a ceasefire in Gaza, although it acknowledged that similar hopes were dashed.
"I think cautious optimism is a fair way to characterize it, though very much tempered by realism," State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters.
21:10 The United States said it had brokered an extension of a ceasefire between pro-Turkish fighters and Syrian Kurds at the flashpoint Manbij town and was seeking a broader understanding with Ankara.
The Manbij truce, which had expired, "is extended through the end of the week, and we will, obviously, look to see that ceasefire extended as far as possible into the future," State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters.
21:00 The military chief of Syria's victorious group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, called on the international community Tuesday to find a solution to Israel's repeated strikes and "incursion" into Syrian territory.
"We view the Israeli strikes on military sites and the incursion into southern Syria as injust... we call on the international community to find a solution to this matter," Murhaf Abu Qasra said in an interview with AFP.
20:00 Netanyahu said Tuesday that Israeli forces will occupy a buffer zone inside Syria, specifically on the summit of Mount Hermon, “until another arrangement is found that will ensure Israel’s security”.
Netanyahu commented Tuesday from the mountain’s snow-dusted summit — the highest peak in the area — on Syria’s side of the border.
19:00 Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu entered Syrian territory on Tuesday during a security tour of the buffer zone seized by Israel in the past few days since the fall of Bashar Assad.
It was apparently the first time a sitting Israeli leader entered Syrian territory.
18:50 United Nations migration agency chief Amy Pope said that tens of thousands of people, including religious minorities, had fled Syria after insurgents ousted Bashar al-Assad.
"Tens of thousands" of people have fled Syria, and "we are hearing that especially religious minorities are leaving," Pope told AFP, noting reports that members of the Shia Muslim community had fled "not because they're actually threatened, but they're concerned about the possible threat."
18:15 Israeli drones and surveillance planes are flying above several towns and villages near southern Lebanon’s Tyre district at a “low altitude,” Lebanon’s National News Agency (NNA) reports.
Separately, NNA quoted the Lebanese army as saying its forces would detonate unexploded ammunition that had been left behind by the Israeli military in the town of Zaghrin in eastern Lebanon’s Hermel district.
18:00 Syria's "conflict has not ended yet," even after the departure of former president Bashar al-Assad, the UN's envoy to the country warned Tuesday, highlighting clashes between Turkish-backed and Kurdish groups in the north.
"There have been significant hostilities in the last two weeks, before a ceasefire was brokered... A five-day ceasefire has now expired and I am seriously concerned about reports of military escalation," said Geir Pedersen, the UN's special envoy for Syria.
"Such an escalation could be catastrophic."
17:20 Iran's supreme leader said Tuesday that Israel and the United States were "completely wrong" to imagine the Tehran-backed axis of resistance had collapsed with the ouster of Syria's longtime strongman.
"With the developments in Syria and the crimes the Zionist regime is committing and the crimes that America is committing, and the help that some others are giving to them, they thought that the resistance was over," Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in a televised speech.
"They are completely wrong."
17:00 Hamas said talks in Qatar on Tuesday aimed at a truce and hostage-prisoner exchange in Gaza were "serious and positive," a day after an Israeli delegation arrived in Doha to meet with mediators.
"Hamas affirms that, in light of the serious and positive discussions taking place today in Doha under the auspices of our Qatari and Egyptian brothers, reaching an agreement for a ceasefire and a prisoner exchange is possible if the occupation ceases to impose new conditions," the Palestinian group said in a statement.
16:30 The financial system in Gaza has suffered catastrophic damage since the outbreak of conflict on 7 October 2023, the World Bank Group said in a statement, highlighting a growing economic crisis that has crippled basic financial services in the region.
An updated World Bank and United Nations Interim Damage Assessment estimates that $14.2 million in damages were inflicted on Gaza’s financial sector between October 2023 and January 2024. The report reveals that 93 percent of bank branches, 88 percent of microfinance institutions, most money changers, and 88 percent of insurance companies in Gaza have been damaged or destroyed.
The damage has left only three of Gaza’s 94 ATMs operational, and the region's sole payment service provider branch has been partially destroyed.
15:50 Intense Israeli airstrikes on Tuesday devastated northern Gaza, killing extended families in their homes, according to medics and local sources. In the southern part of the besieged enclave, Israeli ground forces advanced deeper into Rafah, forcing further displacement of Palestinians seeking refuge.
Medics reported that at least 10 people were killed in an airstrike that destroyed a house in the Daraj neighbourhood of Gaza City, damaging surrounding buildings. In Beit Lahiya, under siege since October, rescuers struggled to reach a site where an airstrike levelled a house, leaving at least 15 dead or missing.
Elsewhere in Gaza City and Beit Lahiya, at least 10 more Palestinians were killed in separate strikes.
In Rafah, Israeli tanks advanced towards Mawasi, a designated humanitarian area along the Mediterranean coast. Residents reported families fleeing northward towards Khan Younis as the army demolished homes and set tents ablaze. Footage showed plumes of smoke rising near tent encampments in the area, home to thousands of displaced Palestinians.
Meanwhile, WAFA reported that Israeli forces committed three massacres in Gaza over the past 24 hours, killing at least 31 Palestinians and injuring 79. The total death toll from the Israeli offensive, which began on 7 October, has risen to 45,059, with over 107,041 injured. The majority of casualties are women and children, according to local health authorities.
15:00 France urged Syria's new rulers to press on with the fight against Islamic State (IS) extremists who had controlled swathes of the country during one phase of its civil war, the foreign ministry said.
French diplomats who went to Damascus to meet the new authorities made clear that Paris would closely watch security in Syria after the fall of Bashar al-Assad, "including continuing the fight against Daesh (IS) and other terrorist groups, and preventing the proliferation of the Syrian regime's chemical weapons," it said.
14:30 The United Nations said it expects around one million people to return to Syria in the first half of 2025 following the collapse of President Bashar al-Assad's rule.
14:10 European Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen said Brussels would intensify its "direct engagement" with Syria's new Islamist-led rulers after the overthrow of Bashar al-Assad.
"Now we have to step up and continue our direct engagement with HTS and other factions," she told a news conference in Ankara, referring to the HTS rebels who ousted the Syrian strongman.
14:00 A resurgence of Islamic State extremists in Syria following the ouster of strongman Bashar al-Assad must not be allowed to happen, EU chief Ursula Von der Leyen said.
"The risk of a Daesh resurgence... is real. We cannot let this happen," she said at a joint press conference with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara, using an alternative name for Islamic State.
13:45 British diplomats have met Ahmad al-Sharaa, the leader of the militant group that toppled Syrian President Bashar Assad.
Photographs posted by the group on social media showed senior officials, including the UK special representative for Syria, Ann Snow, meeting the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham leader, formerly Mohammed al-Jolani, in Damascus on Monday.
Foreign Secretary David Lammy confirmed Monday that Britain had sent “a delegation of senior UK officials to Damascus this week for meetings with the new Syrian authorities and members of civil society groups.”
13:30 An Israeli strike in Gaza killed at least eight people from the same family, most of them women and children, Palestinian medics said Tuesday.
The strike late Monday hit a house in Gaza City’s central neighbourhood of Daraj, according to the Health Ministry’s ambulance and emergency service.
Among the bodies recovered from the rubble were a father and his three children and the children’s grandmother, according to a casualty list obtained by The Associated Press. There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military on the strike.
12:45 In its latest toll, Gaza's health ministry said at least 45,059 people, mostly women and children, have been killed during more than 14 months of Israel's genocidal war on the Palestinian territory.
The toll includes 31 deaths in the previous 24 hours, according to the ministry, which said 107,041 people have been wounded in the Gaza Strip since the war began on October 2023. More than 10,000 people are presumed dead or missing under the rubble.
Palestinians mourn as they stand over shrouded bodies at Al-Ahli Arab hospital, also known as the Baptist hospital, in Gaza City. AFP
12:00 Israel's Defence Minister Israel Katz said that his country's forces would be free to act in Gaza even after the war on the strip ends.
"After eliminating Hamas's military and governmental capabilities in Gaza, Israel would have security control over Gaza with complete freedom of action" for the Israeli military, Katz said in a post on X, noting that it was his own "position."
Katz said that Israel's future control over Gaza should be "exactly like in Judea and Samaria", the biblical names for the West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967 and where its forces conduct frequent raids.
11:00 Iran's foreign ministry said that its embassy in Syria would reopen once the "necessary conditions" are met after the diplomatic mission was vandalised following the ouster of former President Bashar al-Assad.
"The reopening of the embassy in Damascus requires preparations, the most important of which is ensuring the security and safety of the embassy and its staff," said foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei.
He added that work will be pursued "as soon as the necessary conditions are provided," without a specific timeline.
The Iranian embassy in Damascus was ransacked after diplomats abandoned it in the wake of the rapid advance of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham-led militants (HTS) opposed to Assad's rule.
On 8 December, the militants took Damascus and ousted the longtime ruler.
Iran had supported Assad through Syria's civil war, which began in 2011, sending "military advisers" at his request.
But since his fall, Iran has sought to distance itself from the deposed leader, instead stressing the history of friendship between the two countries.
Baqaei said on Tuesday that Iran's "advisory" presence in Syria was "at the invitation of the government".
"We were never in Syria to support a specific person, group or party," he said.
"Our presence in Syria was fundamental and principled, and our withdrawal was responsible."
Baqaei also said that Israel, which has conducted hundreds of airstrikes in Syria since Assad's fall and occupied a UN-patrolled buffer zone, has "severely violated Syria's territorial integrity".
10:30 An AFP correspondent said that a French diplomat arrived at the country's embassy in Damascus, which has been shuttered for years.
Germany and Britain have also said they had sent delegations to hold talks with Syria's new leadership.
Later on Tuesday, foreign ministers from the United States, Britain, France, Germany, and Italy were also due to hold virtual talks on Syria, Rome has announced.
And EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said Monday that the bloc's envoy to Syria was going to Damascus to talk to the new Hayat Tahrir al-Sham-led government (HTS).
EU nations, like others in the West, are wary of Syria's new leadership, with HTS listed as a "terrorist" group by several governments.
UN special envoy to Syria Geir Pedersen had met with Jolani and interim prime minister Mohammad al-Bashir earlier.
France Special Envoy to Syria Jean-Francois Guillaume (L) stands at the entrance of the French Embassy building in the Syrian capital, Damascus. AFP
10:00 President-elect Donald Trump characterized the ouster of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad as an "unfriendly takeover" by US ally Turkey as he addressed the conflict at a news conference on Monday.
"I think Turkey is very smart... Turkey did an unfriendly takeover, without a lot of lives being lost. I can say that Assad was a butcher, what he did to children," Trump told reporters at his residence in Florida.
Years into the Syrian civil war, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) took over parts of northwestern Syria, which borders Turkey. It was from there that the organization and allied militant groups launched the offensive that ousted Assad from power last month.
Turkey has since carried out military strikes inside Syria and has said it is ready to provide armed support to the country's new HTS-led government set up by the militants.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's top priority in Syria was to rid the country of Kurdish separatist fighters — a goal supported by the new government, it has said.
"Turkey is a major force, by the way, and Erdogan is somebody I got along with great," Trump said. "But he has a major military force. And his has not been worn out with war... He's built a very strong, powerful army."
9:15 The US military said its forces carried out an air strike on Monday against a Houthi command and control facility that was used by the Yemeni rebels to coordinate attacks.
"The targeted facility was a hub for coordinating Houthi operations, such as attacks against US Navy warships and merchant vessels in the southern Red Sea and Gulf of Aden," the US Central Command (CENTCOM) said in a statement.
"The strike reflects CENTCOM's ongoing commitment to protect US and coalition personnel, regional partners, and international shipping," it added.
The Houthis have maintained they would immediately halt their attacks on Israel-linked shipping once a ceasefire is established in the Israeli war on Gaza.
9:00 Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) leader Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, now using his real name Ahmed al-Sharaa, said all militant factions in Syria would "be disbanded and the fighters trained to join the ranks of the defence ministry."
Former President Bashar al-Assad fled Syria on 8 December, as armed groups led by militant group HTS captured the capital, Damascus, ending decades of Assad's rule and years of civil war.
Jolani made the remarks Monday while meeting with members of the Druze community as he sought to reassure minorities at home and governments abroad that the country's interim leaders will protect all Syrians and state institutions.
"All will be subject to the law," he added, according to the group's Telegram channel posts.
He also emphasised the need for unity in the multi-ethnic and multi-confessional country.
"Syria must remain united," he said. "There must be a social contract between the state and all religions to guarantee social justice."
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