Hizbullah deputy chief Sheikh Naim Qassem Accuses al-Mustaqbal of Causing Sidon Unrest
Naharnet/Hizbullah deputy chief Sheikh Naim Qassem accused al-Mustaqbal movement on Sunday of standing behind the latest clashes that left scores of casualties in the southern city of Sidon. “Hadn't been for al-Mustaqbal ... civil peace and stability wouldn't have been hit hard” in Sidon, he said. Around 18 soldiers and more than 20 fighters were killed in two days of clashes between Salafist cleric Sheikh Ahmed al-Asir's supporters and the army last Sunday. The fighting in Abra outside Sidon was the worst in Lebanon since the outbreak of conflict in neighboring Syria 27 months ago deepened sectarian tensions. Asir, a staunch anti-Hizbullah sheikh, himself has not been seen since the fighting along with Fadel Shaker, a once-prominent singer-turned Salafist.Qassem said “the instigation against the army and the encouragement of strife led to Sidon's explosion.”“The incidents proved that instigation leads to more troubles and harms the instigators more than anyone else,” he said in reference to al-Mustaqbal.Qassem reiterated the call for the formation of a national unity government that works for the consolidation of civil peace and stability based on the army-people-resistance formula. “We don't want exceptional gains, we want national partnership,” he said, adding “we don't want to isolate anyone and the other way around.”

Qatar New Emir Tells Suleiman, Miqati Presence of Lebanese in Qatar Not in Danger
Naharnet/Qatar's new emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani on Sunday stressed to President Michel Suleiman and caretaker Prime Minister Najib Miqati during talks in Doha that the presence of Lebanese employees in Qatar is not in danger. Suleiman and Miqati, who were accompanied by Deputy PM Samir Moqbel, returned from Doha after they extended congratulations to Sheikh Tamim on assuming his duties as the ruler of the country, Lebanon's National News Agency reported. Suleiman hoped Sheikh Tamim “will continue on the path of Sheikh Hamad regarding the bilateral ties between the two countries and efforts to strengthen them,” NNA said.
Talks also tackled the presence of Lebanese employees in Qatar, with Sheikh Tamim stressing that “this presence is secure and the Lebanese in Qatar are among their family and they have been abiding by and respecting the laws of the State of Qatar.”The emir lauded “their developmental role in Qatar in all fields.”The meeting also addressed “the situations in the region, especially in Syria, and the need to find a political solution and put an end to violence, killing and destruction.”

Aoun: Extending Army Chief Term a Political Deal, We'll Boycott Monday Session over Agenda
Naharnet /Free Patriotic Movement leader MP Michel Aoun said Sunday a possible extension of Army chief General Jean Qahwaji's term would be “a political and not a military deal,” noting that Monday's legislative session is legitimate although the Change and Reform bloc will boycott it over its “agenda.”“Tomorrow's parliamentary session is legitimate,” Aoun said during an interview on al-Jadeed television.“My political stance is boycotting the session for reasons related to its agenda, such as extending the term of the army commander and other items,” he added.“Extending the army commander's mandate would be a political and not a military deal, as competence is the most important thing in the army,” Aoun said. He added that in the wake of the army's sacrifices during the latest deadly battle in Sidon's Abra, the military institution can be “rewarded through being fair in the new wage scale.""The army can be rewarded through preventing the interference of politicians in it, through putting the right man in the right position and through lifting the immunity of MPs and newspapers which attack it everyday," Aoun added. “Why can't we elect an army commander out of 1,500 officers?” he wondered. Aoun asked: “How can we disarm the resistance while the army is not well-equipped?”Asked if he was rejecting the extension of Qahwaji's term because he wanted his son-in-law to become the new army chief, Aoun said: “Brig. Gen. Chamel Roukoz has a CV and they would review it should they decide to appoint him as army commander and this has nothing to do with him being my son-in-law.” “I have not nominated anyone for the post of army commander and the cabinet must convene and names would be raised around the table,” Aoun added.
A three-day parliamentary session set by Speaker Nabih Berri on Monday will likely fail to convene over the boycott of March 14 alliance blocs in addition to an inclination by the Change and Reform bloc not to attend.
An al-Mustaqbal bloc source told An Nahar daily published Sunday that its lawmakers will not participate in the session in compatibility with the rest of the March 14 members.
The Lebanese Forces has considered as unlawful the parliament meetings outside its ordinary sessions. Independent Christian lawmakers led by Batroun MP Butros Harb also rejected the agenda put forward for the session. The session has several draft-laws on its agenda, including the extension of the term of Qahwaji, who turns 60 this September, by raising the retirement age. The major argument made by the March 14 alliance along with Premier Najib Miqati against the session is that parliament can’t convene in the presence of a caretaking cabinet although Berri claimed on Saturday that there was ample evidence of the legislature convening in the past under a resigned government. The latest example is the extension of parliament’s term under the resigned cabinet of Miqati, Berri said. The 128-member parliament convenes twice a year in two ordinary sessions -- the first starts mid-march until the end of May and the second from the middle of October through the end of December.

Lebanon: Sunni “Victimization”
Abdullah Iskandar/Asharq Alawsat
Last Friday witnessed an event of exceptional importance in Lebanon. Sunni Muslims in Sidon and Tripoli, two symbolic cities, prayed in “support” of Sheikh Ahmed Al-Assir’s followers for what has befallen them. This was nearly denouncing Sunni politicians, especially those of the Future Movement, whose responses to the Abra clashes and what followed them seemed lacking in “support” for those who had been wronged. It may seem as if the matter affects the Sunnis, as it certainly does, but it affects at the end of the day all those who still believe it possible for Lebanese of all sects to live together in peace.
Of course, no one is arguing about the right of the state, including the army, to respond to any aggression against it. This is especially true if it is an armed aggression, as was the case with Assir’s supporters, who attacked an army checkpoint in Abra and killed soldiers stationed there. Over the past few years, the Lebanese, and especially the Sunnis among them, have been somewhat excessive in demanding for the state to restore its standing. They also demanded the army to take strict measures to prevent armed clashes that have been recurring in several areas, some of which took on a frankly sectarian nature.
On the other hand, the image of this army has begun to erode among the Sunni public, especially in the periphery. Here, the adopted principle states that repression alone allows for besieging extremist movements and terrorism. Army services have thus engaged in broad campaigns of arrests. If some indictments have been issued in certain cases, a vast number of those detained in miserable conditions have for years been waiting for their fate to be decided, and for whether they are to be indicted or released, if no criminal evidence can be provided against them. There are two thing between which the Sunni public fails to make a distinction: on one hand, the “victimization” they are experiencing for being Sunnis, who express their “Sunni identity” trough affiliation to the Jihadist ideology prevalent in the region – especially since the invasion of Iraq; on the other hand, the fact that the source of such “victimization” is the Lebanese security apparatus, which had in the past been connected to Syria and is today connected to Hezbollah. This means that it considers such “victimization” to be confessional in nature. The ambivalent political discourse adopted by Hezbollah and its media outlets has contributed to driving towards the assertion that the Sunni public has rebelled and rejected the state and its institutions, reaching as far as to establish “Islamic emirates” in this or that Lebanese region. Thus, at a time when all Sunni politicians, without exception, declare their priority to be the state and its security, Hezbollah has resorted to accusing Sunni leaders of supporting extremism. Such accusations reached their peak during the war of the Nahr Al-Bared refugee camp, when Hezbollah-affiliated and Syrian media outlets accused the Future Movement of supporting Fatah Al-Islam and Shaker Al-Abssi, who was later confirmed to be entirely a product of Syria.
With the wave of arrests that followed the events in Dinnieh, the assassination of Rafic Hariri and the recurrent clashes in Tripoli, and sporadically in other areas - reaching up to the Beirut campaign waged by Hezbollah, in which the army remained neutral - this image of the army among the Sunni public became well entrenched.
In other words, the Sunni public considers the army to be targeting it for being Sunni and in order to serve Hezbollah’s goals. The army has therefore entered the arena of confessional division, as took place during the Civil War, when the military institution was ascribed the image of sectarian division in favor of the Maronites.
That is the outcome of last Friday. The Sunni public has come out of its Pandora’s Box; it declared its rejection of the ways, in which Sunni leaders are currently dealing with this “victimization”. This day has revealed even further erosion of the image of moderation and the priority of the state. Inasmuch as Assir, with his confessional crudeness, was of service to Hezbollah’s theories about Sunni extremism and to its campaign against the Future Movement and Sunni politicians, he has to the same extent invigorated the kind of extremism that drives towards infighting and rejects both the state and peaceful coexistence. This is especially true on the background of the war in Syria, of which Lebanon has become one of the fronts.

EU and GCC rap Hezbollah’s role in Syria
The Daily Star/BEIRUT: The European Union and the Gulf Cooperation Council condemned Sunday Hezbollah’s military intervention in Syria and called for an urgent political solution to end more than two years of violence in the war-ravaged country. In a statement issued after their meeting in Manama, Bahrain, the EU and GCC foreign ministers denounced “the participation of Hezbollah’s militia and the other foreign forces in the military operations in Syria.” The ministers voiced their deep concern over the humanitarian needs of the Syrian people inside Syria and in the neighboring countries, the statement said, clearly referring to the more than 1 million Syrian refugees who fled to Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon since the uprising began in Syria in March 2011. Bahrain’s Foreign Minister Sheikh Khaled bin Ahmad al-Khalifa urged Iran’s newly elected President Hassan Rouhani to seek the withdrawal of Tehran-backed Hezbollah fighters from Syria as a gesture to try to ease the civil war there.“The situation is critical in Syria, and we hope that Iran takes a serious step to withdraw the foreign troops in Syria, specifically Hezbollah and other militias,” Sheikh Khaled told reporters after the meeting. Bahrain and other Gulf Arab states have been highly critical of Hezbollah’s intervention on behalf of the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad, who is Iran’s main regional ally. In their statement, the EU and GCC ministers underlined the “importance of the international community’s consensus to find a comprehensive political solution to end the Syrian crisis, stop the shedding of the Syrian people’s blood, achieve their legitimate aspirations, preserve Syria’s security and unity and protect the region from dangerous repercussions.” They also pledged to exert all efforts to help create “appropriate conditions” for the success of the Geneva II peace conference. Earlier, the GCC foreign ministers said Hezbollah’s intervention was obstructing efforts for a political resolution to the conflict, while expressing concern over the repercussions of the Syrian turmoil on Lebanon’s stability. In a statement issued after their meeting held in Manama Saturday ahead of their talks with the EU ministers, the GCC ministers said Hezbollah’s continued involvement in Syria hindered holding another conference to restore peace. They called for putting an end to the interference of Hezbollah’s “militia” in Syria “under the banner of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.”
Hezbollah Secretary-General Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah said last month that his party had decided to fight alongside Assad’s forces in order to prevent the fall of a major backer of his resistance movement. The party played a major role in driving Syrian rebels out of the strategic town of Qusair which fell under government control in June. The GCC ministers reiterated their call for the Lebanese state to abide by the disassociation policy toward events in Syria and prevent any party from interfering in the affairs of the country’s neighbor. GCC members are expected to meet next week in Riyadh to discuss how to impose sanctions on Hezbollah members after deciding to crack down on people affiliated with the group in Gulf countries.Separately, Qatar’s new Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani said Sunday that Lebanese nationals working in his country would not be targeted for expulsion.
Speaking to President Michel Sleiman and caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati who visited Doha to congratulate the new emir on taking the throne, Sheikh Tamim said that the presence of Lebanese in Qatar “is protected and that Lebanese in Qatar live among their people, and adhere to and respect Qatar’s laws,” according to a statement from Sleiman’s office. He praised the contribution of Lebanese to Qatar’s development. Following the GCC’s decision to take measures against Hezbollah’s supporters in their countries, many Lebanese in the Gulf feared they would be expelled from the countries where they are working.
Sleiman extended his greetings to Sheikh Tamim and said he hoped that the new leader would follow the footsteps of his predecessor and father, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, in developing Qatar’s ties with Lebanon, the statement said. It added that Sheikh Tamim and the Lebanese leaders also discussed the situation in the region, particularly in Syria, and the need to find a political solution to end violence, killings and destruction there.

Lebanon: Mikati, March 14 team up to thwart session
By Hussein Dakroub/The Daily Star
BEIRUT: A Parliament session on extending the Army commander’s term will not be held Monday for lack of quorum due to a row over the constitutionality of such sessions with a resigned government, political leaders said.
The March 14 coalition has teamed up with caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati against Speaker Nabih Berri in opposing the session.“The Future bloc and its March 14 allies will boycott Monday’s Parliament session for political and constitutional reasons,” former Prime Minister Fouad Siniora told The Daily Star. “It seems that the Parliament meetings will be used to pass all kinds of draft laws with the presence of a resigned government,” Siniora, head of the parliamentary Future bloc, said, warning against attempts to use Parliament to replace the Cabinet.Also Sunday, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State William Burns arrived in Beirut for talks with top Lebanese officials on security and political developments in Lebanon and the war in Syria. He met with Progressive Socialist Party leader Walid Jumblatt at the latter’s residence in Beirut before holding talks with Siniora at former Prime Minister Saad Hariri’s residence in Downtown Beirut. Burns, who was accompanied in the two meetings by U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon Maura Connelly, did not speak to reporters. The U.S. official will also hold talks Monday with President Michel Sleiman and Mikati. He is to hold a news conference at Beirut airport before his departure. Siniora said that with Mikati’s government in a caretaker capacity since March 22, priority should be given to the formation of a new Cabinet. Asked if any progress has been made to break the nearly three-month Cabinet deadlock, he said: “No breakthrough so far.”Lebanese Forces MP Antoine Zahra said his parliamentary bloc would boycott Monday’s session, adding that his group initially made a mistake by approving a series of Parliament meetings called for by Berri for this week.“We were surprised by draft laws [put on the agenda], and we asked Speaker Berri about the constitutionality of legislation in this period [under a caretaker Cabinet],” Zahra told LBCI TV. He said that Berri explained to them that he had discussed the matter with Sleiman and Mikati.
Hitting back at his critics, Berri defended the legality of the sessions, saying Parliament is already considered to be in an extraordinary session until a new Cabinet is formed. He said all members of Parliament’s secretariat approved the sessions.Berri called three consecutive legislative sessions for this week – from Monday to Wednesday – to study and approve some 45 draft laws listed on Parliament’s agenda. Among these is a proposal to extend the term of Army commander Gen. Jean Kahwagi by raising the retirement age of top military and security officials.
In boycotting the sessions, Mikati and March 14 politicians argued that except for a proposal that would extend Kahwagi’s mandate, none of the 45 draft laws put on Parliament’s agenda were deemed urgent to justify a series of legislative sessions. Free Patriotic Movement leader Michel Aoun, who strongly opposes the extension of Kahwagi’s term, said he and members of his parliamentary bloc would boycott Monday’s session in protest against its agenda. In an interview with Al-Jadeed TV Sunday night, Aoun said the session would not be held for lack of quorum. “Tomorrow’s session is legitimate but we will boycott it for reasons related to its agenda,” he said.
The Kataeb Party called for postponing the Parliament session until consensus was reached to ensure attendance and agreement on the extension of Kahwagi’s term.
Defying the boycott threats, Berri said the session would take place as planned and urged all MPs to attend and vote against any draft law they don’t approve of. He said Parliament was fully entitled to pass laws while there was a resigned government.“All draft laws listed on the agenda are within Parliament’s right to list them. Any talk outside this framework has nothing to do with the Constitution,” Berri said at a rare news conference held at his residence in Ain al-Tineh Saturday. “Parliament is the mother of institutions and no one except the Constitution can stop it from legislation.”
“The principal issue is that Parliament is considered automatically in an extraordinary session and with all its prerogatives, without any curtailments, [when the Cabinet resigns or is considered resigned],” Berri said.
Berri said that history, both before and after the 1989 Taif Accord, had ample examples of Parliament convening while there was a resigned government. Turning to a recent case, he said that Parliament’s term was extended last month under Mikati’s resigned government. In a quick retort to Berri, Mikati said articles in the Constitution prevented a resigned government from attending a Parliament’s legislative session.
Mikati said in light of the resigned government, “it does not make sense that Parliament unilaterally exercises all of its constitutional prerogatives in an absolute manner, without limitations, using an exceptional article that deals exclusively with cases when the government has resigned or is considered resigned.”For his part, Jumblatt defended Berri’s move to convene Parliament, accusing some sides of hypocrisy. “Wasn’t the Parliament’s term extended under the eyes of the resigned government? What has changed?” he asked.

Lebanon: Syria war wreaks havoc on drug industry
July 01, 2013/By Lysandra Ohrstrom
The Daily Star/BEIRUT: Thousands of businesses have been destroyed over the course of the Syrian conflict, but few of the war’s economic casualties have had such immediate consequences for public health as the collapse of the country’s pharmaceutical industry. In the late 1980s, Syria’s pharmaceutical sector consisted of two state-owned plants whose combined production accounted for just 6 percent of the country’s needs and the annual expenditure on imported medicine averaged $700 million. By 2010, following a wave of government-led economic liberalization in the early 1990s, Syria boasted 70 privately owned pharmaceutical plants that mainly produced low-cost generic drugs and employed at least 17,000 people – 85 percent of whom were women – according to a survey conducted by the Syrian Health Ministry and the World Health Organization in 2011.
The market was valued at $620 million, more than $400 million of which served the local market and supplied 91 percent of the nation’s pharmaceutical needs. The remainder – which cost anywhere from 30 to 70 percent less than comparable products in neighboring markets – was exported to approximately 52 countries, making Syria the second-largest drug supplier in the region.
Heavily concentrated in Aleppo, the industry has been decimated by the fighting and its many side affects over the past two years. At least 25 Syrian pharmaceutical plants have been completely destroyed by the fighting or taken over by militias, and most of the others have been forced to suspend production due to sky-rocketing costs; the difficulties of transporting, distributing, and storing pharmaceutical shipments across the country; and the inability to access raw materials, according to a representative of one international non-governmental organization operating on the ground in Syria who spoke on condition of anonymity.
A handful of factories continue to operate sporadically at barely a third of their pre-crisis capacities, but overall pharmaceutical production in Syria has dropped 75 percent since 2010, according to the most recent Syria Humanitarian Assistance Response Plan released by the United Nations in June.
Demand for medicine has surged during the same period, and as a result, the country has experienced a critical shortage of pharmaceutical products since July 2012, the SHARP report said. Treatment for chronic diseases has been “severely interrupted,” vaccination coverage has dropped from 95 percent in 2010 to 45 percent in 2013, and pharmaceutical products that were once produced in Syria at affordable prices – such as insulin, oxygen, anesthetics, serums and intravenous fluids – are no longer available. The aid worker said the government has been in talks with countries such as Iran, Belarus and Cuba about importing medicine, but even transit difficulties were overcome both government health expenditures and the purchasing power of the population have plummeted severely alongside the value of the pound.
“Even for a rich country, 500,000 injured is nearly impossible to cope with,” the aid worker told The Daily Star. “Around Homs you’ve started to see people selling traditional local medicines at the market because nothing else is available.”
According to interviews with managers or owners of four Syrian pharmaceutical factories that have continued to manufacture throughout the crisis at varying levels, between 10 to 15 such plants in the country are currently operating. Three in Damascus are reportedly running at full capacity, though the Daily Star was only able to reach one of them for confirmation.
All the sources spoke on condition of anonymity and asked that the names of their companies not be revealed, because so many manufacturing facilities have been targeted in the conflict.
“Before the problems we were No. 7 in the market and still there is a lot of demand for our products,” said the owner of one pharmaceutical factory that is currently operating at 20 to 25 percent of capacity.
“The problem is getting raw materials and the cost of production.”Before the crisis, drug manufacturers relied on raw materials imported to the port of Latakia or by air to Syria from Europe, Australia and the U.S., according to a joint report by the WHO and the Syrian Health Ministry. The company owner said he was currently importing raw materials through Lebanon, but was having difficulty clearing the shipments through customs because the Lebanese Health Ministry was “giving Syrian manufacturers a lot of trouble about clearing our shipments.” When his company is able to obtain raw materials, he is forced to sell at a loss because the law requires pharmaceutical manufacturers to abide by prices set by the Syrian Health Ministry which have not been modified since the value of the Syrian pound was 48 to the dollar. “The ministry hasn’t changed the prices and they won’t, so we have to sell the products at a quarter of their market value,” the source said. “We stopped selling on the local market because we were losing money so we are trying to maintain exports because we can sell those in dollars,” he said. Earlier this month, the Syrian government announced that it would resume financing imported raw materials again after the program was suspended in May. Though the source said the government opened a few new lines of credit for industrialists last week, they were still pricing the pound at 175 to 180 to the dollar, which is far below the black-market exchange rate of a minimum of 200 to the dollar that manufacturers have to buy supplies at, he said, so even with the state funds, he was producing at a loss. “We are trying to convince the prime minister and the health minister that they need to support the industry by raising the price we are allowed to sell medicine for,” the source said. “I cannot pay $5 for something and sell it for $1. I should be able to sell it at $5.50.”
The owner of a different Syrian pharmaceutical company that is currently producing about 40 percent of the medicine it manufactured before the war also cited the prewar medicine prices as one of the many obstacles facing the sector, along with the lack of transit and banking tools at their disposal. “There are problems everywhere in the cycle,” he told The Daily Star. “We are facing huge losses on production costs. Then there is the difficulty shipping within Syria. Then once we finish the transit, we don’t have a distributor. Then when we get shipments to pharmacists they don’t want to hold on to them for more than one or two days, because they are afraid they will get stolen and their stores would become targets.”
He singled out the inability to make and receive transfers through international banks as the single largest impediment to doing business. “Although pharmaceutical products are not subject to international sanctions, the banks don’t differentiate between medical and humanitarian goods and other products so they block us,” he said. “All of our credit lines have been terminated. Whenever we want to transfer money to someone to buy raw materials, they see Syria and they reject transfer. Most suppliers won’t deal with Syria, even if there is a humanitarian need.”
Despite these obstacles, the functioning factories are managing collectively to produce enough to meet between 5 and 10 percent of the nation’s pharmaceutical needs. “The best thing for us would be to stop completely, but for humanitarian reasons we can’t,” he said. “The only solution is for the U.S. to instruct all banks and companies to accept transfers to and from Syria for humanitarian reasons.”A manager of one of the three factories that is still operating in Damascus at full capacity said that his company was negotiating with the government to increase the price pharmaceutical manufacturers are allowed to charge for certain essential medicines and expects the ministry to announce the new regulations in the near future. When asked whether the factory would still be operating at a loss after the new prices take affect he said, “We are not working at this time for profit.”

Intermittent clashes break out in n. Lebanon
The Daily Star/Lebanese Army soldiers patrol Tripoli’s Bab al-Tabbaneh neighborhood. TRIPOLI, Lebanon: Intermittent clashes broke out in Tripoli, north Lebanon, Sunday between supporters and opponents of Syrian President Bashar Assad, a source in the city told The Daily Star. In the afternoon, gunmen from al-Baqqar neighborhood whose residents support Syria’s uprising exchanged gunfire with rivals in Jabal Mohsen that largely backs Assad, the source said. Other front lines in the city remain calm so far. Tripoli has witnessed bloody rounds of fighting since the outbreak of unrest in neighboring Syria in March 2011.
The clashes have claimed the lives of dozens, wounded hundreds and caused extensive material damage. The last wave of violence struck the city in May and was over only in early June.

Lebanese Parliament spat endangers maternity Leave
By Kareem Shaheen/The Daily Star
BEIRUT: Expectant mothers across the country could see their maternity leave extended to 70 days if Parliament approves the measure in a vote this week. But the long-sought amendment to Lebanon’s labor law could be held hostage to more delays if Parliament fails to convene.New mothers in Lebanon can currently take up to seven weeks of paid maternity leave, far short of that recommended by the International Labour Organization. Mothers who work in the public sector receive 60 days of leave. Some activists are optimistic the law will pass this final obstacle. “I am eager as all future moms in Lebanon to have a decent and fair period of at least 10 weeks of maternity leave instead of the very unfair and insufficient 49 days that the labor law currently allows us to have,” said Rita Chemaly, a women’s rights activist.
Chemaly, who is herself seven months pregnant, said the 49 days allowed under the current law are not enough, with children requiring breastfeeding and having irregular sleep patterns. Parents whose families cannot help them take care of a newborn may need to pay more money for domestic help.
“It is a must that a mother and her newborn take enough time after the delivery,” she said.
Activists say the measure faces opposition from business owners concerned about the economic fallout of longer maternity leave. In addition, even if the measure passes, it still falls short of international regulations.
The Maternity Protection Convention, which was approved in 2000, requires at least 14 weeks of maternity leave to new mothers, and the ILO recommends that the period be extended to 18 weeks. Lebanon has not ratified the convention. But activists say the 10 weeks are a first step toward broader rights.
“The non-governmental organizations have accepted the 10 weeks as a first step in their lobbying campaign to amend the labor law,” said Chemaly. “A longer period at this time in Lebanon will make women’s position at the workplace precarious.” “We have to be realistic,” said Chantal Bou Akl, who worked with the National Commission for Lebanese Women on the draft amendment.
Bou Akl said women’s rights issues might gain more traction in Parliament if there were more female lawmakers, but added that the country also faced economic difficulties that needed to be taken into consideration.
Speaker Nabih Berri called for three back-to-back parliamentary sessions from Monday to Wednesday to discuss 45 draft laws, one of which is the maternity leave amendment, in the first sessions since the Parliament renewed its mandate and postponed elections until late next year. The sessions are in jeopardy over caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati’s announcement that he will boycott them over constitutional concerns.
Mikati, who stepped down in March, argues that Parliament can only meet to discuss urgent matters under a resigned government.
But Bou Akl said politics should not derail important social causes. “We have to separate the humanitarian issues from politics in Lebanon,” she said.
The draft amendment was referred to Parliament by the Cabinet last year, and went through several parliamentary committees before being tabled before the general assembly. Fady Karam, the secretary-general of the NCLW, which drafted the amendments, said he sensed some opposition sparked by business owners. The debate is essentially one of “balancing rights and the job market,” he said. Changes to the law might lead companies to hire men instead of women to avoid the economic cost of pregnancy on employers. Karam said the law had to clear many hurdles to reach the voting stage, passing through several parliamentary committees and legal hurdles as well as consultations with business owners on the economic consequences of extended maternity leave. The NCLW is headed by first lady Wafaa Sleiman. The amendments are part of a broader campaign by Sleiman, launched in 2011, to fight discrimination against women in the workplace. According to the ILO, Lebanon is second to in its length of maternity leave, edging only the United Arab Emirates, which offers 45 days.
Bou Akl agrees that seven weeks of maternity leave is not enough.“The child still needs me,” she said. “I want time with my kids, I want to develop a relationship with the child.”

Syrian Regime battles to tighten control of central Syria
Agencies/AMMAN: President Bashar Assad’s forces pounded Sunni rebels in the city of Homs with artillery and from the air Sunday, the second day of an offensive to expand loyalist control over Syria’s strategic center, activists said. They said rebels defending the old center of Homs and five adjacent Sunni districts had largely repelled a ground attack Saturday by Assad’s forces but reported fresh clashes and deaths within the city Sunday.
The offensive follows steady military gains by Assad’s forces, backed by Hezbollah militants, in villages in Homs province and towns close to the Lebanese border.
British Foreign Secretary William Hague said Assad must halt his “brutal assault” on Homs. Opposition sources and diplomats said the loyalist advance had tightened the siege of Homs and secured a link to Hezbollah strongholds in Lebanon and to army bases in Alawite-held territory near the coast, the main entry point for Russian arms that have given Assad a key advantage in firepower.
Homs, a city of about 1 million, has shown great sympathy for the opposition since the early days of the uprising. A month after it started, protesters carried mattresses, food and water to the main Clock Square, hoping to emulate Cairo’s Tahrir Square, the epicenter of the Egypt’s January 2011 revolution. Security forces quickly raided the site, shooting at protesters and chasing them through the streets.
The onslaught only boosted the intensity of the protests, fueling a revolt that has posed the most serious challenge to date to the Assad dynasty that has ruled since 1970.
At least 100,000 people have been killed since the Syrian revolt erupted in March 2011, making the uprising the bloodiest of the Arab Spring popular revolutions against autocrats.
The Syrian conflict is increasingly pitting Assad’s Alawite minority, backed by Shiite Iran and its Hezbollah ally, against mainly Sunni rebel brigades supported by the Gulf states, Egypt, Turkey and others.
The Sham News Network opposition monitoring group said fighters belonging to the Al-Qaeda-linked Nusra Front had killed five loyalist troops in fighting in the Bab Houd district of Old Homs Sunday.
Activists said one woman and a child had been killed in an airstrike on the old city, home to hundreds of civilians.
Video footage taken by the activists, which could not be immediately verified, showed the two bodies being carried in blankets as well as a man holding a wounded child with a huge gash in his head.
Rebel fighters also fought loyalist forces backed by tanks in the old covered market, which links the old city with Khaldieh, a district inhabited by members of tribes who have been at the forefront of the armed insurgency.
“After failing to make any significant advances yesterday, the regime is trying to sever the link between Khaldieh and the old city,” Abu Bilal, one of the activists, said from Homs.“We are seeing a sectarian attack on Homs par excellence, the army has taken a back role. Most of the attacking forces are comprised of Alawite militia being directed by Hezbollah,” he said.
The Alawites are an offshoot of Shiite Islam that have controlled Syria since the 1960s, when members of the sect took over the army and the security apparatus which underpin the power structure in the mainly Sunni country.
Located at a major highway intersection 140 km north of Damascus, Homs is a majority Sunni city. But a large number of Alawites have moved into mostly new and segregated districts in recent decades, drawn by army and security jobs.Lebanese security forces said Hezbollah appeared to be present in the rural areas surrounding Homs but there was no indication that it was fighting in the labyrinth streets of Homs, where it could take heavy casualties.
Anwar Abu al-Waleed, an activist, said rebel brigades were prepared to fight a long battle, unlike in Qusair and Tal Kalakh, two towns in rural Homs near the border with Lebanon that fell to loyalist forces in recent weeks.
“We are talking about serious urban warfare in Homs. We are not talking about scattered buildings in an isolated town but a large urban area that provides a lot of cover,” he said. Britain’s Hague expressed concern over the escalation of fighting in Homs: “I call upon the Assad regime to cease its brutal assault on Homs and to allow full humanitarian access to the country.”

Mursi has not saved himself, his group or Egypt
By: Tariq Alhomayed/Asharq Alawsat
Whatever the repercussions of today’s events in Egypt, history will write that the current president, Dr Mohamed Mursi, was unable to save either himself, the Muslim Brotherhood or Egypt. It will do so in the same way that history books tell of how the former president, Muhammad Hosni Mubarak, was unable to save himself and his party.
The latest (and lengthy) presidential speech was a political disaster. It untied his opponents and, when the president attacked everyone but the military, dissuaded those who were neutral. In anticipation of today’s events, this is to be expected, especially where the army is concerned. It has placed a remarkable emphasis on alignment with the people, which it did not do on January 25, 2011.
His speech not only united political opponents, but also united institutions against him and his group. The president did not provide solutions or concessions, since he was unable to improve Egypt’s political prospects.
Whatever takes place today, it is clear that the president has missed an opportunity to save Egypt, himself, and the Muslim Brotherhood. After having spent a year in power, there have not been any real efforts to include opponents or even to maintain alliances with the Salafists, for example. Also, the Brotherhood has not worked to reassure the average Egyptian, even after having received their votes.
The Brotherhood has made one mistake after another. They infiltrated and swamped the judicial institutions of Al-Azhar, the economy and the media. This is in addition to the story surrounding the writing of the constitution. All this was done without a serious attempt to improve the situation. The Brotherhood was sinister in its seizure of powers, and extending their influence over all aspects of the state. This was a fatal mistake, since Egyptians felt that what the Brotherhood was doing implied that they will never leave government—no matter what happens.
Accordingly, the Muslim Brotherhood, and the president before them, missed every opportunity to reassure everyone and to achieve genuine accomplishments. They risked social peace, and failed to stop the bloodshed. And today, the Muslim Brotherhood faces streets packed with divided protesters, an army on alert, and an economy on the brink of collapse. Despite that, it continues to mobilize its disciples, rather than seeking to defuse the situation, while the president continues to waste opportunities to rescue that which is still possible—be it himself, his party or Egypt. The best that the president could now do is call for early elections before it is too late, which could be a week. After all, a week is a long time in politics.
It is therefore clear that history will write that the Egyptian president did not save himself, his party or his country—all of which would pay a heavy price if the president were to be toppled. For the Muslim Brotherhood, this would not be exclusive to Egypt. Just as the group has ascended collectively throughout the region, the fall would be likewise collective.

Nasserist-nationalist, anti-US slogans unexpectedly dominate anti-Morsi protests in Cairo
DEBKAfile Exclusive Report July 1, 2013/The protest rallies against Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi staged across Egypt Sunday June 30, a year after he took power, offered two surprises. Rather than an outpouring of anti-Islamist rage, the tenor of the banners, placards and chants raised over Cairo’s Tahrir Square echoed the slogans of pan-Arab, nationalism, socialism and xenophobia, with which the charismatic Gemal Abdel Nasser caught the Arab world by storm half a century ago. The Muslim Brotherhood rule in Egypt, thrown up by the Arab Revolt, may face the challenge of a neo-Arab nationalistic uprising, a throwback to the Nasserist era.
There was also a strong strain of anti-American sentiment. In Cairo, placards of US Ambassador Anne Patterson, accused of currying favor with the Muslim Brotherhood, were hoisted alongside those of President Morsi – both defaced with large red exes. The second surprise was the less-than expected turnout – hundreds of thousands rather than 3-5 million the organizers hoped to rally in Cairo alone and no more than two-to-two and a half million in all the main city centers combined. According to the Egyptian Interior Ministry, 17 million demonstrators counting supporters and opponents of the president, were in the streets Sunday night. Our sources say this figure is much inflated.No one is even trying to guess what sort of Egypt will emerge from this new turbulence, or who will rule the country when it subsides. Some facts and figures may offer some clues to where Egypt is heading:
1. The organizers of the “Tamarod” (Rebellion) have laid long-term plans for a civil disobedience campaign to disrupt the government administration until it is forced to quit - although the initial phase was marked with scattered violence: Seven people were killed Sunday night and 700 injured, after seven were left dead in clashes between pro-and anti Morsi supporters in the past week, including an American.
The protest leaders claim to have harnessed various anti-government groups – liberals, pro-democracy factions, academics, members of the free professions, secular politicians, students and ordinary people who elected the Muslim Brother for jobs and a better and safer life and are now jobless and unable to feed their families.
Among the demonstrators in Tahrir Square Sunday night were police officers and judges.
2. The next stage planned is for a shutdown of public transportation, factories, financial companies and the flow of oil and gas in and out of Egypt. Within days, the country will face electricity and water outages and start the grim descent into complete chaos.
3. The uprising has a leader, the Nassersit Hamdeen Sabahi, who came in third place after Morsi in last year’s presidential election. But the trouble for the protest leaders is that he is virtually faceless on the national scene and has never made his mark as a figure able to inspire the masses to rise up against the government. Without a strong figure, the uprising may soon lose traction.
 

Millions of Egyptians: Mursi ‘Irhal’
Agencies/CAIRO: Millions of Egyptians flooded onto the streets on the first anniversary of Islamist President Mohammad Mursi’s inauguration Sunday to demand he resign, as the opposition urged them to remain until he did so.“It is the biggest protest in Egypt’s history,” a military source told AFP on condition of anonymity. Chanting “Irhal” or “Get out!” and waving national flags, a crowd of more than 200,000 had massed by sunset on Cairo’s Tahrir Square in the biggest demonstration since the 2011 uprising that overthrew Mursi’s predecessor, Hosni Mubarak. While the main protests were peaceful, at least one Mursi supporter was shot dead and 37 people wounded in fighting in the town of Beni Suef, south of Cairo, and dozens suffered gunshot wounds during an attack on a Muslim Brotherhood office in Housh Eissa, in the northern Nile Delta. The group’s headquarters in Cairo was set ablaze by protesters exchanging gunfire with guards and throwing petrol bombs. A second person was killed in the central province of Assiut when gunmen on a motorbike opened fire on protesters, a security official said. In a statement entitled “Revolution Statement 1,” the main opposition coalition urged “all the revolutionary forces and all citizens to maintain their peaceful [rallies] in all the squares and streets and villages and hamlets of the country ... until the last of this dictatorial regime falls.”“The people want the fall of the regime!” protesters shouted, echoing the rallying cry that brought down Mubarak – this time yelling it not against an aging dictator but against the first elected leader in Egypt’s 5,000 year recorded history.
Many bellowed their anger at Mursi’s Muslim Brotherhood, accused of hijacking the revolution and using electoral victories to monopolize power and push through Islamic law. Others feel alienated by a deepening economic crisis and worsening personal security, aggravated by a political deadlock over which Mursi has presided. As the working day ended and 38 Celsius heat eased, more protesters converged through the eerily deserted streets of the shuttered city center, while smaller crowds protested in several other areas of the capital. The veteran leaders of Egypt’s secular, liberal and left-wing opposition, including former chief of the U.N. nuclear watchdog Mohamed ElBaradei and leftist presidential candidate Hamdeen Sabahi, joined protest marches in Cairo. A Reuters journalist said hundreds of thousands of anti-government protesters marched through Alexandria, and a military source reported protests in at least 20 towns. The army said millions of protesters were out across the country. Mursi was monitoring events from the heavily guarded Qubba presidential palace, where a spokesman appealed for the demonstrations to remain peaceful. “Maintaining the security of Egypt is the common responsibility of everyone,” presidential spokesman Ehab Fahmy told a news conference. “Dialogue is the only way to reach mutual understanding and to reach national agreement around the different issues of our homeland.”
The attacks against Brotherhood offices were the latest in more than a week of sporadic violence in which hundreds have been hurt and several killed, including an American student. More than 20,000 supporters of Mursi congregated outside a Cairo mosque not far from another suburban presidential palace, where protest organizers planned a sit-in from Sunday evening. Interviewed by a British newspaper, Mursi voiced his determination to ride out what he sees as an undemocratic attack on his electoral legitimacy. But he also offered to revise the new, Islamist-inspired constitution, saying clauses on religious authority, which fueled liberal resentment, were not his choice. He made a similar offer last week, after the head of the army issued a strong call for politicians to compromise. But the opposition dismissed it as too little too late.
“We call on Mohammad Mursi, who has completely lost the legitimacy of his power, to quickly respond to the clear will of the people which is plain today in all corners of revolutionary Egypt,” the June 30 movement, which organized a nationwide petition demanding his resignation, said in a statement. Some Egyptians seem to believe the army might force the president’s hand, if not to quit then at least to make major concessions to the opposition.
The armed forces used military helicopters to monitor the protests in Cairo and Alexandria and a military source said chief-of-staff and Defense Minister Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi was following the situation from a special operations room. Mursi and the Brotherhood hope the protests will fizzle like previous outbursts last December and in January. If they do not, some form of compromise, possibly arbitrated by the army, may be on the cards.
Both sides insist they plan no violence but accuse the other – and agents provocateurs from the old regime – of planning it. The U.S.-equipped army shows little sign of wanting power but warned last week it may have to step in if deadlocked politicians let violence slip out of control. U.S. President Barack Obama called for dialogue and warned trouble in the most populous Arab nation could unsettle an already turbulent region.
In an interview with London’s Guardian newspaper, Mursi repeated accusations that what he sees as entrenched interests from the Mubarak era were plotting to foil his attempt to govern. But he dismissed the demands that he give up and resign. If that became the norm, he said, “well, there will be people or opponents opposing the new president too, and a week or a month later, they will ask him to step down.”