By Najia Houssari — Arabnews.com –– BEIRUT: The outlook for Lebanon’s Qana gas field project appears promising, caretaker Energy Minister Walid Fayyad said on Friday as authorities race against time to resume exploration work after demarcating the maritime borders with Israel in October. Fayyad visited the Janus 2 ship at Beirut port, brought by TotalEnergies and its partners Eni and QatarEnergy to complete environmental surveys of the offshore Block 9 in the exclusive economic zone in preparation for oil and gas exploration. “We expect positive results from the survey, but we must be realistic and await discovery,” Fayyad said. During the past few days, Israel announced the start of its commercial production in the Karish field. The Janus 2 has completed an eight-day mission during which it collected images of the seabed, and took samples of water and sediment. It also monitored marine life in the area, providing data for an environmental impact assessment study, an essential step before drilling under international and local law.

The Lebanese are pinning their hopes on a successful exploration that will unlock oil and gas reserves worth billions, helping to revive the country’s faltering economy. The local currency has lost over 120 percent of its value during the past three years. The pound fell to 82,000 to the dollar on Friday, a day after protesters attacked banks and blocked roads in a display of anger over the deteriorating economy and sharp rises in the price of essential items.

By James Zogby — thenationalnews.com — Several weeks ago, I wrote an article outlining a radical proposal Ralph Nader and I put forward for discussion. The proposal called on Lebanon’s civil society to petition the UN to declare Lebanon a “failed state” requiring international intervention. Many readers commented favourably on the idea, also registering their frustration with Lebanon’s corruption and dysfunction. Others noted that, although the idea was worth considering, they believed that it would never pass the Security Council. The point of the proposal, however, was not to present a fait accompli. Rather, it was to spur exactly the type of discussion that ensued.

What’s clear is that Lebanon is broken, and its people are suffering. Its governing institutions aren’t functioning, and its traditional leadership appears incapable of meeting the challenges confronting the country. Evidence of this dysfunction is the fact that for the past four months Lebanon’s Parliament has been unable to elect a president. In the face of this paralysis, we have witnessed a courageous and important step being taken by a group of newly elected members of the Lebanese Parliament, who have been conducting a protest sit-in, now in its fourth week, at Beirut’s Parliament building. Led by two of the independent “Forces of Change” group of newly electeds, Najat Saliba and Melhem Khalaf, the protesters are calling on their colleagues to convene and fulfil their responsibility to elect a president so that at least a semblance of a functioning government can be formed.

By Jamie Prentis – the nationalnews.com — The circus over who will become Lebanon’s next president continues to scale new heights. Speaker Nabih Berri has even stopped scheduling presidential sessions in the deeply divided 128-seat legislature, while two new MPs are holding an indefinite sit-in in parliament in a bid to find a successor to Michel Aoun. And then, on Monday, representatives of the US, France, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Egypt warned Prime Minister Najib Mikati — whose cabinet is in a caretaker role — that they would reconsider “all ties” if Lebanon failed to elect a president. The governance vacuum comes at a time when Lebanon finds itself entrenched in one of the worst economic crisis in modern history, blamed on decades of corruption and mismanagement by the country’s elite.

What next for Lebanon’s opposition in presidential race, Michel Moawad or Plan B? Amid the deadlock, one name has stood out from the rest in the 11 parliamentary sessions. Michel Moawad has consistently courted the support of a third of parliament — a long way off the two-thirds majority required in the first round and the absolute majority needed in subsequent sessions in the same round — but his voice still carries weight. Mr Moawad is very open in saying that he would happily stand aside for another candidate if they are able to secure more votes and have the credentials he supports. Mr Moawad is very open in saying that he would happily stand aside for another candidate if they are able to secure more votes and have the credentials he supports. “Having a president is extremely important,” he told The National from his office in Baabda, minutes away from the presidential palace that Mr Aoun departed from in October. “But … it’s not the election of any president. It’s the election of a president that is sovereigntist, that is reformist, and that is ready to tackle clearly the issues and problems that have led Lebanon to the total collapse that we are living in today.”

By Najla Houssari — arabnews.com — In his Sunday sermon, Maronite Patriarch Bechara Boutros Al-Rahi said the Arab and international communities condemned their “corruption,” adding that parliament should convene as soon as possible and decide on a new presidential head. He said: “Yes, the president is a Maronite, but the voters are not all Maronites and Christians. “Indeed, Christian leaders are responsible for the presidential vacuum, but the greater responsibility rests with others. Christians cannot agree over the identity of the president while others cannot agree over the identity of the republic. “We are thus keen not to harm the identity of neither the president nor the republic because they are a guarantee of Lebanon’s unity.” Referring to the parliamentarians, he added: “Are you respecting your top constitutional responsibility of electing a president who legislates the work of parliament and the government? Are you carrying out the internationally required reforms? “Are you letting the judiciary carry out its duties and investigate the Beirut port explosion to reveal the truth and implement justice? “Are you implementing the measures expected from the International Monetary Fund and the international community? “Are you achieving the state of law and eliminating chaos, the proliferation of illegal weapons, and the law of the jungle? “Are you consolidating Lebanon’s sovereignty over all its lands and establishing its independence?”

by reuters — BEIRUT: Lebanon’s veteran central bank chief Riad Salameh said he would not seek a new term in office once his latest six-year stint at the head of the Banque du Liban ends. “My decision is that, at the end of the term, it will be a page I turned in my life […]

For the past two decades, search engines have answered most users’ queries in the same way: with a ranked list of webpages. But Microsoft’s unveiling of its AI-powered Bing search engine this week suggests this period of stasis is over, tech critic Kevin Roose writes. Using natural language, a user can ask Bing to do tasks as diverse as planning a dinner party — it’ll serve up a menu with links to sources — to drafting a social media post or summarizing a financial report. “It’s an entirely new way of interacting with information on the internet,” Roose writes.

An AI arms race is underway between two tech giants. Here’s who has an edge.

by Tanya Dua — Linkedin — A deep-dive into one big theme or news story every week. Though I hesitated to call it as such until recently, the rapidly unfolding events of the past week would suggest that we’re squarely in the midst of an AI arms race. ICYMI: Last Friday, Google invested $300 million into Anthropic on the heels of Microsoft’s (LinkedIn’s parent company) recent $10 billion investment into ChatGPT-creator OpenAI. Google quickly followed with an unveiling of its own AI chatbot, Bard, on Monday. Microsoft then made waves when, a day later, it announced ChatGPT’s integration with its search engine Bing.

Google has had an indisputable stranglehold on search for a long time, but the heralding of AI as the next big frontier in technology has somewhat leveled out the playing field. And the viral popularity of ChatGPT is only adding more heat, with the OpenAI chatbot recently becoming the fastest-growing consumer app in internet history. “The internet search wars are back,” declared the Financial Times’ Richard Waters, noting that AI has “opened the first new front in the battle for search dominance since Google fended off a concerted challenge from Microsoft’s Bing more than a decade ago.” And this time around, Google is at a disadvantage, not just because of Microsoft’s first-mover advantage or Bard’s bumpy debut this week, some experts say.

Maldives ranked 9th  What are the top 10 smallest countries? These countries are ranked as the top 10 smallest in the world Vatican City (0.19 square miles) Monaco (0.78 square miles) Nauru (8.1 square miles) Tuvalu (10 square miles) San Marino (24 square miles) Liechtenstein (62 square miles) Marshall Islands (70 square miles) Saint Kitts […]

نجم الهاشم

By Gloria Dickie LONDON (Reuters) – The magnitude 7.8 earthquake that struck Turkey and Syria on Monday is likely to be one of the deadliest this decade, seismologists said, with a more than 100 km (62 miles) rupture between the Anatolian and Arabian plates. Here is what scientists said happened beneath the earth’s surface and what to expect in the aftermath:

WHERE DID THE EARTHQUAKE ORIGINATE? The epicentre was about 26 km east of the Turkish city of Nurdagi at a depth of about 18 km on the East Anatolian Fault. The quake radiated towards the northeast, bringing devastation to central Turkey and Syria. During the 20th century, the East Anatolian Fault yielded little major seismic activity. “If we were going simply by (major) earthquakes that were recorded by seismometers, it would look more or less blank,” said Roger Musson, an honorary research associate at the British Geological Survey. Only three earthquakes have registered above 6.0 on the Richter Scale since 1970 in the area, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. But in 1822, a 7.0 quake hit the region, killing an estimated 20,000 people.

HOW BAD WAS THIS EARTHQUAKE?

On average, there are fewer than 20 quakes over 7.0 magnitude in any year, making Monday’s event severe. Compared with the 6.2 earthquake that hit central Italy in 2016 and killed some 300 people, the Turkey-Syria earthquake released 250 times as much energy, according to Joanna Faure Walker, head of the University College London Institute for Risk and Disaster Reduction. Only two of the deadliest earthquakes from 2013 to 2022 were of the same magnitude as Monday’s quake.

WHY WAS IT SO SEVERE?

By Le Figaro — CRITICISM – The excellent investigation carried out by Sofia Amara and Jérôme Fritel reveals the networks of hidden financing, thanks to drugs, of the Shiite militia. Hezbollah, the prohibited investigationa three-part documentary not to be missed, this Sunday February 5 at 8:55 p.m. on France 5. With Hezbollah,Iran has created the most powerful asymmetrical military force in modern history.” One of the hardest to pin down as well. Former CIA agent Robert Baer, ​​who spent years tracking down Lebanon’s “Party of God,” knows this. More than a real investigation into its forty years of existence, Hezbollah, the prohibited investigationthe documentary in three 52-minute episodes each by journalists Jérôme Fritel and Sofia Amara, broadcast this Sunday February 5 on France 5, is first and foremost the story of an infiltration operation by the financing networks of the Lebanese Shiite militia in from drug money.

Alongside Bashar al-Assad

An infiltration codenamed Cassandra, which will lead the sleuths of the American DEA (Drug Enforcement Administration) from Colombia and Venezuela to West Africa before ending in a fiasco on the altar of cold realpolitik in Paris, the day of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani’s visit to France in January 2016. Thanks to telephone interceptions, the DEA had managed in the early 2000s to infiltrate one of its agents of Lebanese origin with Chekri Harb , responsible on behalf of Hezbollah for part of the drug trafficking that the movement organizes from Colombia.

Over more than fifteen years, the agency then succeeded in identifying one by one the barons of a cartel which brought in up to 1 billion dollars a year to Hezbollah. From Ali Fayad, in charge of buying weapons for drugs in Russia and Ukraine for the war waged by the militia alongside Bashar el-Assad in Syria, to Mohammed Nourredine, who supervised operations in Europe from Paris , via Ali Joumaa, Ali Kharoubi, Adnan Tabaja and Abdallah Safieddine, the “godfather” of the cartel, as if by chance ambassador of the militia to his Iranian godfather.

Abductions of Americans and French