MANAMA: A Nepalese doctor has received Bahrain’s prestigious Isa Award for Service to Humanity for pioneering a mortality-reducing cataract procedure that has saved thousands of lives in his home country and beyond.

Dr. Sanduk Ruit, an ophthalmologist with more than 35 years’ experience, was awarded by Bahrain’s King Hamad bin Isa Al-Khalifa on Tuesday morning.

TEL AVIV, Israel: The Israeli military said Tuesday it has sentenced a member of the Islamic Jihad militant group to 22 months in prison after his arrest helped spark three days of heavy fighting in Gaza last year.
Bassam Al-Saadi’s sentence was handed down as part of a plea deal that included suspending an additional sentence and ordering Al-Saadi to pay compensation, the army said in a statement. Al-Saadi he had been convicted for illegal association, incitement and impersonation.

JERUSALEM: Israel’s parliament on Monday voted to push ahead with a contested overhaul of the country’s judicial system championed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s religious-nationalist government that has sparked mass protests.
Opposition in parliament vowed to “fight for the soul of the nation” while tens of thousands of Israelis gathered in the streets outside trumpeting their objection. Lawmakers argued late into the night before the proposed changes were approved in a first reading.

AMMAN: The King Faisal II/16 Brigade, a unit of the Jordanian Armed Forces, conducted a joint tactical exercise with British military forces on Monday, the Jordan News Agency reported.

The drill, part of the “Olive Grove” series of joint military exercises carried out by the two nations, took place in Jordan in the presence of the brigade’s commander, Omar Shqeirat, and the UK’s defense attache in the country, Will Davis.

BEIRUT: Lebanon could be headed to oblivion, the head of the country’s independent advisory body warned on Monday.

Charles Arbid, president of the Economic and Social Council, told an emergency meeting at the headquarters of the General Labor Union that with no savior on the horizon, the nation risked spiralling out of control.

He said: “We fear that Lebanon as we know it is changing under the leaders who could not care less about its fate.