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Charbel Matar says a Lebanese saint saved his life when he was a child. Now, he is among pilgrims of all faiths who visit Saint Charbel’s tomb, soon to be graced by Pope Leo XIV.”My family and I have great faith in Saint Charbel and always visit him,” said Matar, 69, at the Saint Maron Monastery in Annaya in the mountains of north Lebanon. “I almost died when I was five. He performed a miracle and saved me from death, and kept me alive for 64 more years,” said Matar, whose parents changed his name from Roger to Charbel to honour the saint.In Pope Leo’s first trip abroad since becoming head of the Catholic Church, the US-born pontiff will travel to Turkey and Lebanon, arriving in Beirut on November 30 and visiting the Annaya monastery the following day.Saint Charbel has broad popular appeal in Lebanon even beyond the Christian community, with many seeing him not only as a miracle worker but also as a national symbol.Depictions of the saint with a white beard, his eyes lowered in prayer and wearing black garb, can be found in homes, vehicles and workplaces.Randa Saliba, 60, called Saint Charbel “a message of love… and the face of Lebanon”. The pope’s trip to his tomb was a must, she said during a visit to the monastery with her family.The Catholic Church “can’t deny the miracles he performs and the people whose souls he transforms. He’s keeping the Christian message alive,” she added.- ‘Not just Christians’ -Charbel was born Youssef Makhlouf in north Lebanon in 1828 and entered the Lebanese Maronite Order aged 23, later joining Annaya’s Saint Maron Monastery, where he became a hermit, leading an ascetic life.He was declared a saint in 1977.Workers have been busy resurfacing the road to the quiet monastery in preparation for the arrival of the pope while visitors, including women wearing the Muslim hijab head covering, toured the site, lit candles or prayed faithfully to their saint.Vice rector Tannous Nehme, excitedly awaiting the pope’s visit, estimated that the monastery drew around three million visitors annually.”It’s not just Christians — a lot of Muslims come to visit, a lot of non-religious people come to visit. They come from everywhere — Africa, Europe, Russia,” Nehme said.As incense lingered in the air, the stone monastery’s tranquillity was interrupted only by the sound of restoration work on Saint Charbel’s tomb.When it was opened in 1950 in the presence of clergy, officials and doctors, they found his body well-preserved, more than half a century after his death in 1898.Black-and-white footage of the event is still occasionally shown on Lebanese television.The monastery has recorded tens of thousands of people who have been cured by Saint Charbel, with thousands of others believed to have been healed outside Lebanon.One of the saint’s most famous miracles is that of Nohad al-Shami from Lebanon’s Byblos region who was struck by an incurable illness in 1993.Shami said Saint Charbel came to her in a dream and healed her. She died this year, aged 75.- ‘Optimism’ for Lebanon -Pope Leo’s visit to Lebanon follows those of Benedict XVI in 2012 and John Paul II in 1997.His trip includes meetings with senior officials in the crisis-hit country including President Joseph Aoun, the Arab world’s only Christian head of state.Under multi-confessional Lebanon’s sectarian power-sharing system, the post of president is reserved for a Maronite Christian.Lebanon’s Maronite church is in full communion with Rome.”The pope’s visit is very important for Lebanon. It brings goodness and blessings… and optimism for the Lebanese people,” said Claude Issa, 56, a mother of three.Lebanon has been no stranger to calamity in recent years.A ceasefire in November 2024 was supposed to end more than a year of hostilities between Israel and militant group Hezbollah in which some 4,000 people were killed in Lebanon.But Israel has kept up deadly strikes despite the truce, and many fear a return to expanded Israeli raids.Before the war, Lebanon was reeling from an economic collapse that began in 2019, and a catastrophic explosion at Beirut’s port the following year that killed more than 220 people and injured some 6,500.The pope will hold a silent prayer at the site of the explosion, for which nobody has yet been held accountable.”The pope’s visit will revitalise people and make them feel there is still hope in Lebanon,” Issa said.

Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces on Monday announced a unilateral three-month ceasefire a day after the army dismissed a US truce proposal from international mediators.The RSF, which has been fighting Sudan’s regular army since April 2023, said it was declaring the ceasefire “in response to international efforts, including the initiative of US President Donald Trump and the Quad mediators”.The Quad group comprises the United States, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt.The RSF move came after the UAE lambasted army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan for rejecting the US truce proposal and accusing Washington of echoing Emirati positions on the conflict.The UAE has been widely accused of arming the RSF, but Abu Dhabi has repeatedly denied the charge.On Monday, the RSF announced “a humanitarian truce providing for a cessation of hostilities for three months”.The announcement was made in a recorded video message by Burhan’s former deputy and now bitter rival, RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Daglo.On Sunday, Burhan called a truce proposal sent by US envoy Massad Boulos on behalf of the Quad group of mediators the “worst yet” and unacceptable to his government, which is based in Port Sudan on the Red Sea.The army chief called the Quad group “biased” as long as the UAE was a member, and accused Boulos of parroting talking points from Abu Dhabi.On Monday, the UAE’s minister of state for international cooperation, Reem bint Ebrahim Al Hashimy, lambasted Burhan for demonstrating “consistently obstructive behaviour”.”This must be called out,” Hashimy said.Rejecting the US plan, Burhan said the proposal “eliminates the armed forces, dissolves security agencies and keeps the militia where they are”.- Civilian rule -On November 6, the RSF announced they had agreed to a proposal for a humanitarian truce put forward by the international mediators.The army-aligned government had rejected an earlier plan in September that would exclude both the military and the RSF from Sudan’s post-war political process.That proposal included a three-month humanitarian truce, followed by a permanent ceasefire and a nine-month transition to civilian rule.Last week, Trump said he would move to end the Sudan war, after Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman urged him during a visit to Washington to get involved.Burhan thanked the two leaders for what he called their “honest” initiative, but urged mediators to “come with a positive and proper approach”.Among the general’s criticisms of the US proposal were claims that it “eliminates the armed forces, dissolves security agencies and keeps the militias where they are” without disarming them.Reiterating that the conflict was “a war for survival”, he insisted that any peace agreement must compel the RSF to withdraw fully from captured territory and be confined to designated zones.Burhan also attacked repeated claims by Daglo that the army is controlled by the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood.”Where are these so-called members of the Muslim Brotherhood within the Sudanese army? We do not know them. We only hear such claims in the media,” Burhan said.Daglo on Monday said the RSF was open to talks with “all actors except for the terrorist Islamist movement of the Muslim Brotherhood and the National Congress”, the now-banned party of former Sudanese leader Omar al-Bashir.Daglo worked for years for Bashir before allying with Burhan to overthrow him in 2019 as part of Sudan’s revolution. The pair then snuffed out Sudan’s fledgling civilian government.International attention on the conflict has increased since the RSF seized the key Darfur city of El-Fasher last month after a relentless siege that has sparked warnings of crimes against humanity and genocide.Over the past two years, the warring parties in Sudan have violated every ceasefire agreement, with negotiations to halt the war yet to make any breakthroughs.

Hezbollah held a funeral on Monday for its top military chief and other members of the militant group a day after a deadly Israeli strike on south Beirut, while Iran’s Revolutionary Guards urged revenge.Haytham Ali Tabatabai is the most senior commander from the Iran-backed group to be killed by Israel since a November 2024 ceasefire sought to end more than a year of hostilities between the two sides.Sunday’s raid came with Israel escalating its attacks on Lebanon and Washington increasing pressure on the government to disarm the group and cut off its sources of funding.Tehran slammed Tabatabai’s killing as “cowardly” while Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said “the right of the Axis of Resistance and Lebanese Hezbollah to avenge the blood of the brave fighters of Islam is unquestionable” — referring to Iran-backed armed groups hostile to Israel.Hundreds of supporters joined Monday’s funeral procession in Beirut’s densely populated southern suburbs, where Hezbollah holds sway, for Tabatabai and two of his companions, whose coffins were draped in the group’s yellow flags, an AFP correspondent said.The crowd yelled slogans against Israel and America, while supporters carried portraits of the group’s leaders and Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.France’s foreign ministry and UN chief Antonio Guterres’s spokesman expressed concern at the strike and urged restraint, with the UN’s Stephane Dujarric reminding parties that “civilians and civilian areas must not be targeted”.- ‘Civilian areas’ -Israel’s military had said it “eliminated the terrorist Haytham Ali Tabatabai, Hezbollah’s chief of general staff”.The group announced the deaths of Tabatabai and four other members in the attack.Hezbollah said Tabatabai assumed the role of military leader after the latest war with Israel, which saw the group heavily weakened and senior commanders killed including its longtime chief Hassan Nasrallah.Israel has carried out near-daily strikes on Lebanon despite the ceasefire, usually saying it is targeting Hezbollah members and infrastructure, and accusing the group of rearming.According to the truce, Hezbollah was to withdraw north of the Litani River, some 30 kilometres (20 miles) from the Israeli border, and to have its military infrastructure there dismantled.Under a government-approved plan, Lebanon’s army is to finish disarming Hezbollah in the area by year’s end, before tackling the rest of the country.Hezbollah has rejected calls to surrender its weapons.After Tabatabai’s killing, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would “not allow Hezbollah to rebuild its power” and urged Lebanon’s government to “fulfil its commitment to disarm Hezbollah”.A source close to Hezbollah told AFP on condition of anonymity there were “two opinions within the group — those who wish to respond to the assassination and those who want to refrain from doing so — but the leadership tends to adopt the utmost forms of diplomacy at the present stage”.- ‘Very limited’ options -Senior Hezbollah official Ali Damush told the funeral that Tabatabai’s killing aimed to push Hezbollah into “surrendering and submitting, but this goal will never be achieved”.Israel was “worried about Hezbollah’s possible response — and should remain worried”, he said, urging Lebanese authorities to “confront the aggression by all means… and reject the pressures that seek to push Lebanon to comply with American dictates and Israeli conditions”.Atlantic Council researcher Nicholas Blanford told AFP that “Hezbollah’s options are very limited”.”Its support base is clamouring for revenge but if Hezbollah responds directly… Israel will strike back very hard and no one in Lebanon will thank Hezbollah for that,” he said.Sunday’s strike was the biggest blow to Hezbollah since the ceasefire “because of (Tabatabai’s) seniority… it demonstrates the Israelis can still locate and target senior officials despite whatever protective measures Hezbollah is undertaking” since the war, Blanford added.Lebanon’s army says it is implementing its plan to disarm Hezbollah, but the United States and Israel have accused Lebanon’s authorities of stalling.Condemning the attack, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said Sunday that “the only way to consolidate stability” was through “extending the authority of the state over all its territory”.Last December, Hezbollah also lost a key supply route through Syria with the fall of longtime ruler and ally Bashar al-Assad.