AP:  Ricky Martin, the world-renowned singer and UNICEF goodwill ambassador,
said that the word “refugee” had lost its value but that the
international community should “open its heart.”

The 44-year-old Puerto Rican spoke during a visit to Lebanon with UNICEF to meet Syrian refugee children.”At this point what we want is to make sure children get their rights.
Some children unfortunately are not going to school,” he said Thursday
in an exclusive interview with The Associated Press in Minnieh, north
Lebanon. News of the visit was released by UNICEF on Friday because of
an embargo.

The singer met with Syrian children in Zahleh, in the Bekaa Valley on
Wednesday, and in the Minnieh informal settlement, near the northern
city of Tripoli, the following day.

Daily Star.com.lb — Nizar Zakka, a Lebanese-American businessman detained in Iran last
September, is due to appear in court Monday, his organization said
Friday. Zakka, founder and Secretary General of the Union of Arab
ICT Associations (IJMA3), has been accused by Iranian media of being an
American spy.
 Zakka disappeared in Tehran in September after
attending a government-sponsored conference at the invitation of
Shahendokht Molafrdi, Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s vice president
for women’s affairs, in order to attend the Second International
Conference and Exhibition on Women in Sustainable Development, named
“Entrepreneurship and Employment”.

The IJMA3 statement said that Zakka “is undergoing further physical
and psychological pressure by his captors in an attempt to extract
confessions out of him before his trial kicks off on June 6, 2016.” IJMA3
criticized the Lebanese state for not supporting Zakka, saying “he is
alone in facing an illegal trial… due to his arbitrary arrest and the
conditions and harsh questioning he went through.”

al-monitor.com: The web series format is growing in popularity in the Arab world,
providing youths and others with an uncensored forum for self-expression
and an outlet for social commentary.

“Zyara,”
a Lebanese documentary web series, has been attracting international
attention since December 2015, winning awards at competitions in Bilbao,
Buenos Aires, Dublin, Rome and other European festivals. The first
installment of “Zyara,” which means “Visit,” consists of 12 short
videos, around five minutes each, in which a person talks about his or
her life.

Cinematographer Muriel Aboulrouss, speaking for herself and producer
Denise Jabbour, described Zyara as “depicting intimate portraits of
various Lebanese individuals sharing their hopes and dreams, stories
about love, fears and most memorable experiences.”

middleeasteye.net – Lebanese
police arrested a prominent human-rights lawyer this week after he
accused government officials of complicity in a sex trafficking ring
involving Syrian refugees that was broken up earlier this year, Human Rights Watch said. Police detained Nabil al-Halabi, executive director of the Lebanese Institute for Democracy and Human Rights, in
a dawn raid on his home on Sunday after Interior Minister Nuhad Mashnuq
and a senior adviser filed separate lawsuits for libel and slander of a
public official, both criminal rather than civil offences in Lebanon.

HRW
called for Halabi’s immediate release, criticising both the manner of
his arrest and the jail sentence of up to one year if found guilty.