Our prayers are with the Coptic victims! We denounce these barbaric attacks

by AP – At least 26 Coptic Christians have reportedly been killed by gunmen in Egypt. The Christians were travelling by bus to a monastery when they were attacked. Many of those killed were children, according to the New York Times. Health officials said that the attack happened on Friday while the bus was travelling on the road to the St Samuel Monastery in the Minya governorate, about 220 kilometres, or about 140 miles, south of the Egyptian capital. The health ministry has said there were between eight and 10 attackers dressed in military uniforms, according to witnesses. Khaled Mogahed, the health ministry spokesman, said that the death toll had reached 26 but feared it could rise further. According to Copts United news portal, only three children survived the attack. Arab television stations showed images of a damaged bus along a roadside, many of its windows shattered. Ambulances were parked around it as bodies lay on the ground, covered with black plastic sheets. Though no one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, it had all the hallmarks of Egypt’s Islamic State affiliate. Egypt has seen a wave of attacks on its Christians, including twin suicide bombings in April and another attack in December on a Cairo church that left over 75 people dead and scores wounded. The Islamic State group in Egypt claimed responsibility for them and vowed more attacks.

The Associated Press –BEIRUT (AP) — The Lebanese government has reappointed Lebanon’s long-serving Central Bank governor for another six year term. The renewal of Riad Salameh’s term sends a positive signal to international investors at a time of regional turbulence when Lebanese banks are increasingly under scrutiny from the U.S. Treasury. The U.S. administration is […]

by Melissa Nann Burke, Detroit News Washington Bureau  Washington — John Akouri, president and CEO of the Lebanese American Chamber of Commerce in Royal Oak, is under consideration as the next ambassador to Lebanon, according to reports. Akouri is a former city councilman in Farmington Hills and a GOP strategist who co-chaired President Donald Trump’s […]

This article represents only the opinion of the author BEIRUT, May 25 (Xinhua) — Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah launched a verbal attack Thursday on Saudi Arabia and the Riyadh summit, accusing it of being behind all the terrorist activities that are targeting the countries of the region and the world. In a televised speech to […]

by catholicherald.co.uk – The US president said it was a ‘very great honour’ to meet the Pope   Pope Francis and US President Donald Trump spent 30 minutes speaking privately in the library of the Apostolic Palace May 24, and as the president left, he told the Pope, “I won’t forget what you said.” The […]

By Elise Harris – CNS

Rome, Italy, May 23, 2017 / 03:18 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- When U.S. President Donald Trump stops in Rome for a meeting with Pope Francis Wednesday, both his wife Melania and daughter Ivanka will have their own schedules, which include stops at a Vatican hospital and a round-table on human trafficking. Ivanka serves in her father’s administration in an unpaid position as an assistant to the president. Pope Francis and Donald Trump will meet at the Vatican May 24 at 8:30 a.m., before the Pope’s General Audience. Melania and Ivanka will both be present for the public portion of the visit, but will each follow their own itinerary after.Once the meeting is finished, the First Lady will a visit the Vatican-owned pediatric hospital Bambino Gesu. During her tour of the facility, Melania is expected to greet patients and visit one of their playrooms as well as the chapel.    While Melania visits Bambino Gesu, Ivanka, a high-profile adviser to her father, will make her way to the Roman neighborhood of Trastevere to meet with the Community of Sant’Egidio to discuss efforts to oppose human trafficking.

The Sant’Egidio Community is often praised by Pope Francis for their work, in particular for the projects they lead aimed at helping the poor and refugees. During her meeting with Sant’Egidio, Ivanka is expected to meet with several women who are victims of trafficking, and discuss various ways in which the Church and the U.S. government can collaborate on the problem. Before leaving with her father on his first international tour, Ivanka hosted an anti-human trafficking round-table at the White House May 17 that hosted a swath of bipartisan lawmakers and representatives of numerous organizations that deal with human trafficking.   According to reports, during the discussion Ivanka spoke about the Trump administration’s efforts to combat trafficking not only in the U.S., but throughout the world, telling attendees that “combatting human trafficking and modern slavery is both a moral and strategic interest domestically and abroad.”

by Aoibheann O’Sullivan

The unit of six UNIFIL French peacekeepers, carrying a stretcher with a colleague strapped to it, turned the corner and saw the menacing lattice of ropes about 50 cm off the ground glinting in the afternoon light. They hardly broke their pace as they yelled instructions to each other, and then leopard-crawled at haste under the web of ropes, dragging their stretcher-bound teammate with them. The crowd watching roared in appreciation. Close on their heels were teams from the Lebanese Armed Forces, UNIFIL Malaysia, Ghana and Republic of Korea contingents. The dust kicked up by the competition caught the evening sun as it no doubt used to during Roman times when chariots entertained the crowds.The archaeological Roman hippodrome in the Lebanese city of Tyre is one of the largest and best preserved hippodrome in the world. The site once seated around 20,000 spectators and hosted dramatic chariot races. Last Sunday, this ancient site was a fitting backdrop for the annual Military Olympiad between UNIFIL and the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF).

 As teams of Lebanese military personnel and UNIFIL peacekeepers sweated it out in friendly, but gruelling competitions, Brigadier General Liot de Nortbecourt, UNIFIL Chief of Staff, contextualised the event, “The reason we’re here today is to support two associations that take care of wounded soldiers, their families and children of martyrs. The first one is a French association based in Paris ‘Terre Fraternité’ and the second association ‘Association of the Martyr Lt Col Sobhi Al Akoury’ is named after the first LAF martyr in Nahr al-Bared battles and it protects and supports the families and children of these Lebanese Army martyrs.” Each association received a donation of US$ 23,000, but not before military personnel had to compete in boot-camp style events. These included “Chronos”, where teams of 10 personnel race to pull a 6,100-kg truck for 150 metres, and the appropriately named “Hades”, where teams of seven each had to do a rugged cross fit relay circuit. 

by Rania Ghanem  The 2016 average room rate in Beirut hotels was the same level as that in 1996, which was $166. Significant changes however had been registered over the years with rates reaching their peak of $281 in 2009. Both figures were stated in the recent report: ‘2017 Middle East hotel survey – Chaos […]

by Naharnet  U.S. President Donald Trump compared Hizbullah in a landmark speech on Sunday to extremist organizations such as Islamic State and al-Qaida, as he lauded the Lebanese army for fighting IS and Lebanon for hosting a huge number of Syrian refugees. “We now face a humanitarian and security disaster in this region that is […]

by Wendell Steavenson- The guardian 

Kamal Mouzawak grew up in Jeita, a small town in the mountains north of Beirut, during the Lebanese civil war. One of his earliest memories was when his mother was out of the kitchen and he decided to make a cake. He thought to himself: ‘What is a cake?’ He stirred a slurry of flour, sugar and eggs in an empty sardine tin because he could not find a cake pan and cooked it on top of the stove. “It was a burnt omelette!” he laughed, remembering the experiment over lunch this spring in Beirut. “But what still amazes me is the metamorphosis of ingredients.” Over the last decade, Mouzawak has created a recipe for transforming people’s lives through food. He now presides over a network of markets, restaurants, bed-and-breakfasts and community outreach programmes in Lebanon.

Some projects are non-profit, others for-profit, and through them Mouzawak has developed a model of social entrepreneurship that is as much about empowering people as selling products. His brings together farmers, chefs, NGOs, designers and artisans, connecting people to politicians and business to ethics. One morning, in his main restaurant in Beirut, I watched him conduct three business meetings simultaneously, moving from table to table, discussing photographs for a new cookbook, plans for a new restaurant and giving a quick briefing to a group of European journalists on a tour. His enterprise is called Souk el Tayeb. Souk is Arabic for market and tayeb is a useful word with several meanings, including good, kind, delicious. It signifies acceptance, acknowledgement and thank you all rolled into one. Souk el Tayeb began as a farmers’ market in 2004.

I lived in Beirut when the market first opened on a scratched patch of car park, one of the bald spots in a city destroyed by 15 years of civil war. It sold orange blossom honey from the citrus orchards in the south, thick dark pomegranate molasses made by a grandmother in a mountain village, jars of pickled radishes, cucumbers, peppers; feta cheese preserved in oil with thyme and chillies. The sambousek stuffed with ground lamb and spinach always sold out within the first hour. Fresh fruit from across Lebanon at the Souk el Tayeb farmers’ market in Beirut. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Fresh fruit from across Lebanon at the Souk el Tayeb farmers’ market in Beirut. Photograph: Natalie Naccache for the Observer The market is still one of the great wonders of the Middle East. I walked along the rows of stalls one recent sunny spring Saturday morning, marvelling, wide-eyed and hungry.