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Lebanon should block Israel gas extraction move: Hezbollah chief

Lebanon should block Israel from extracting gas from a disputed offshore field, Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah said Thursday, warning a hydrocarbon exploration company hired by Israel against proceeding with its activities.

"The immediate objective should be to prevent the enemy from extracting oil and gas from the Karish gas field," part of which is claimed by Lebanon, Nasrallah said in a televised speech.

This file photo taken on June 3, 2022 and obtained from Egypt's Suez Canal Authority shows a tugboat pulling an Energean floating production storage and offloading ship along the Suez Canal

Activists urge Meta to overhaul policies for Iran content

Three rights groups on Thursday urged Facebook and Instagram owner Meta to overhaul its policies for Persian-language content on Iran, complaining restrictions had impeded the ability of Iranians to share information during ongoing protests.

London-based freedom of expression group Article 19, global digital rights group Access Now and the New York-based Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI) said Meta had to change policies on potentially sensitive content as well as human and automated moderation.

With the internet heavily censored in Iran, Instagram owned by Meta is now the main platform for communication in the Islamic republic

Egypt denies jailed dissident on hunger strike

Egypt's interior ministry said Thursday it has footage of jailed dissident Alaa Abdel Fattah that "disproves" a report from his family that he has been on hunger strike for 10 weeks.

The footage, recorded inside his cell, "was delivered to the public prosecution", the ministry said in a statement.

The 40-year-old activist and blogger, long-dubbed an icon of Egypt's 2011 revolution, is on "day 69 of hunger strike", his sister Mona Seif said Thursday.

Egyptian activist and blogger Alaa Abdel Fattah gives an interview at his home in Cairo on May 17, 2019

Auction gathers horse-lovers from across divided Libya

A trainer walks a mare around a grassy pen under the gaze of potential buyers from across Libya, where passion for horses is undimmed despite years of violence.

The three-day auction in the Mediterranean city of Misrata found homes for 96 of some 150 horses on sale.

And despite years of conflict and division since the fall of dictator Moamer Kadhafi in 2011, breeders and buyers from across Libya were able to attend.

"There were horses from the west, the east and the south -- from every city in the country," said Hussein Shaka, one of the organisers.

A three-day auction in Libya's Mediterranean coastal city of Misrata found homes for 96 of some 150 horses on sale

Israel's Bennett holds talks in UAE after Iran snub, trade deal

Israel's Prime Minister Naftali Bennett held talks with the leader of the United Arab Emirates on Thursday during a surprise visit, a day after a formal rebuke of Iran by the UN's nuclear watchdog.

Bennett's second trip to the UAE, which normalised relations with Israel in 2020, also comes after the two countries struck a free-trade deal last month and as his governing coalition faces a serious challenge from the right-wing opposition.

Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett issued the warning on Iran's nuclear programme after the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency met him during a whirlwind visit

Forest fire fears over new Greek migrant camp

Months behind schedule and dogged by lawsuits, critics say a vast new migrant camp on the Greek island of Lesbos is a potential forest fire hazard that could wreak havoc on the environment.

Officials say it is desperately needed on an island at the forefront of Europe's migrant crisis, where hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers have arrived from countries such as Syria and Afghanistan since 2015.

Would-be 'mystic mercenaries' go on trial in Germany

Two former German soldiers went on trial on Thursday for trying to form a paramilitary group to fight in Yemen's civil war after being inspired by a psychic.

Achim Allweyer, 52, and Arend-Adolf Graess, 60, attempted to set up a "terrorist organisation" after receiving "messages from a fortune teller that they understood as binding instructions for action", according to prosecutors.

In this file photo from January 26, 2022 a Yemeni fighter from the UAE-trained Giants Brigades mans a position near the village of Jafra on the outskirts of Marib

Iran removal of monitoring cameras may scupper nuclear talks: IAEA

The UN atomic energy watchdog said Thursday that Iran was removing 27 surveillance cameras at its nuclear facilities, warning this could be a "fatal blow" to negotiations to revive a 2015 nuclear deal.

Talks began in April last year to bring the United States back into that landmark agreement, after then president Donald Trump withdrew in 2018 and left it hanging by a thread.

The negotiations also aim to lift sanctions against Iran and bring it back into compliance with nuclear commitments it made to world powers as part of the deal.

Iran's national flag flies at the Bushehr nuclear power plant, the Islamic republic's only nuclear power station which was built by Russia

Egypt's tanoura puts kaleidoscopic spin on dervish tradition

In a 500-year-old stone theatre in the Egyptian capital, two young dervishes spin ceaselessly. Slowly, then all at once, they are consumed in a flurry of vivid fabrics.

Born into a lineage of whirling dervishes, Mohamed Adel, 20, takes great pride in the uniquely Egyptian interpretation of the centuries-old ritual known colloquially as "tanoura", or skirt in Arabic.

Egypt's kaleidoscopic whirling dervish performance, known as 'tanoura', is a world away from those of Turkey, who trace their origins to the teachings of Sufi poet and mystic Jalal al-Din Rumi

Visitors trickle back to Syria citadel used by jihadists

An ancient lake-side fortress once used by jihadists to launch attacks is slowly regaining its status as a key cultural destination, attracting visitors from across war-torn Syria.

Families posed for pictures under the hot June sun, some perched on an ancient brick wall overlooking the banks of Lake Assad, a man-made reservoir in northern Syria's Raqa province.

Abdullah al-Jaber was visiting Qalaat Jaabar with his children for the first time even though they live less than an hour away by car.

The ancient lake-side fortress of Qalaat Jaabar is slowly regaining its status as a key cultural destination, after it was occupied for part of the last decade by the Islamic State group