DUBAI: An Arab actress has been arrested in Dubai for hosting two birthday parties without adhering to the emirate’s strict coronavirus measures against gatherings.
Dubai Police said the artist was arrested after sharing a Snapchat video of her birthday party alongside her friends and guests, without social distancing and without wearing face masks. Police identified the actress using only her initials.
“The artist, M.H., organized two parties for her birthday in two different restaurants in the emirate in the presence of several people, in violation of the decision issued by the Attorney General of the United Arab Emirates No. 38 of 2020,” the police statement said. 
The Attorney General said those who violate precautionary measures will be fined 10,000 dirhams ($2,700) for holding gatherings, meetings or private parties or public parties.
Authorities will also punish the two restaurants that violated the measures for allowing to organize the birthday parties, and not adhering to the precautionary measures against the coronavirus. 

RIYADH: King Hamad said on Monday Bahrain is committed to an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital, in accordance with the Arab peace initiative.

The king was speaking after Bahrain, along with the UAE, signed agreements with Israel last week to normalize relations.

The king said Manama’s position on the Palestinian issue was firm and permanent and that Bahrain is commitment to achieving a two-state solution, “Our steps toward peace and prosperity are for the benefit of all” and “are not directed against any entity or forces,” King Hamad said. “They are in everyone’s interest and aim for good neighborliness.”

He said Bahrain signed the Abraham Accords with Israel “on the basis of Bahrain’s vision of establishing comprehensive peace and considering it a strategic option to advance the peace and stability process in the Middle East region, which contributes to strengthening international peace and security.”

In a statement after a cabinet meeting, the king said he was proud of the broad Arab and international support of Bahrain’s move.

Foreign Minister Abdullatif bin Rashid Al-Zayani  presented a report to the council of ministers on the signing ceremony between Bahrain, the UAE and Israel that was hosted by Donald Trump.

At the end of the meeting, King Hamad congratulated Saudi Arabia, its king, government and people on the 90th National Day.

BEIRUT: Lebanon has retrieved the bodies of four people including a child after they tried to flee the crisis-hit country by sea on an overloaded dinghy, the civil defense said Monday.
A week ago, UN peacekeepers retrieved one body and rescued 36 people from a boat in trouble in international waters off the Lebanese coast.
Families of the survivors said the boat had been adrift without food or water for around a week, during which time several passengers had died or jumped overboard to find help.
The bodies are presumed to be from the same ill-fated crossing.
Since Friday, “we have retrieved four bodies — belonging to two Lebanese, one of whom was a child, a young Indian man and a Syrian man,” Samir Yazbek, the head of the civil defense’s sea rescue unit, told AFP.
The bodies were found in four separate locations off the north and south coasts of the country, and the search was ongoing, he added.
The UN refugee agency said last week that 25 Syrians, eight Lebanese and three people of other nationalities had been rescued from the boat.
It is unclear how many men, women and children originally clambered aboard the dinghy, and therefore how many are still missing.
On Saturday, the navy said it would step up its searches within and outside Lebanon’s territorial waters to find any other victims.
Relatives of those who went missing from the impoverished north Lebanese city of Tripoli say the people smuggler involved in the crossing has dropped off the radar since the tragedy.
They have filed three legal complaints against the man, who they say is a well-known figure in the community.
A military source on Saturday said a person acting as an intermediary between passengers and the boat owner had been arrested.
In recent weeks, dozens of Lebanese and Syrians have tried to make the perilous sea journey from Lebanon to the Mediterranean island of Cyprus, authorities on both sides say.
The Republic of Cyprus, a European Union member, lies just 160 kilometers (100 miles) away.
Lebanon is in the throes of its worst economic crisis in decades, compounded since February by the novel coronavirus pandemic.
It is also reeling from a monster blast at Beirut’s port last month that killed more than 190 people, ravaged large parts of the capital and reignited public anger against the political class.

BEIRUT: Lebanon registered a record 1,006 cases of COVID-19 over the past 24 hours, the government announced Sunday, amid a sharp increase in infections and deaths due to the new coronavirus.
Health Minister Hamad Hassan recommended a total lockdown for two weeks to stem the alarming rise in daily detected infections, but authorities will find it difficult difficult to impose another lockdown amid an unprecedented economic collapse.
The new cases registered by the Health Ministry bring the overall number of confirmed cases in Lebanon to 29,303, while deaths have reached 297 since the first case was reported in the country in late February.
It was the third consecutive record-breaking day of confirmed virus cases.
The rise began after a lockdown was eased and the country’s only international airport was reopened in early July. The surge continued after the massive Aug. 4 explosion in Beirut’s port that killed 193 people, injured at least 6,500 and devastated much of the city.
The blast also overwhelmed Beirut’s hospitals and badly damaged two that had a key role in handling virus cases.

AMMAN: Syrian opposition sources said Russian jets bombed rebel-held northwestern Syria on Sunday in the most extensive strikes since a Turkish-Russian deal halted major fighting with a cease-fire nearly six months ago.
Witnesses said the warplanes struck the western outskirts of Idlib city and that there was heavy artillery shelling in the mountainous Jabal al Zawya region in southern Idlib from nearby Syrian army outposts. There were no immediate reports of casualties.
“These 30 raids are by far the heaviest strikes so far since the cease-fire deal,” said Mohammed Rasheed, a former rebel official and a volunteer plane spotter whose network covers the Russian air base in the western coastal province of Latakia.
Other tracking centers said Russian Sukhoi jets hit the Horsh area and Arab Said town, west of the city of Idlib. Unidentified drones also hit two rebel-held towns in the Sahel Al-Ghab plain, west of Hama province.
There has been no wide-scale aerial bombing since a March agreement ended a Russian-backed bombing campaign that displaced over a million people in the region which borders Turkey after months of fighting.
There was no immediate comment from Moscow or the Syrian army who have long accused militant groups who hold sway in the last opposition redoubt of wrecking the cease-fire deal and attacking army-held areas.
The deal between Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin also defused a military confrontation between them after Ankara poured thousands of troops into Idlib province to hold back Russian-backed forces from new advances.
Western diplomats tracking Syria say Moscow piled pressure on Ankara in the latest round of talks on Wednesday to scale down its extensive military presence in Idlib. Turkey has more than ten thousand troops stationed in dozens of bases there, according to opposition sources in touch with Turkish military.
Witnesses say there has been a spike in sporadic shelling from Syrian army outposts against Turkish bases in the last two weeks. Rebels say the Syrian army and its allied militias were amassing troops on front lines.
Two witnesses said a Turkish military column comprising at least 15 armored vehicles was seen overnight entering Syria through the Kafr Lusin border crossing in the direction of a main base in rural Idlib.