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More than 700 police deployed across the UK city of Birmingham Thursday for protests planned ahead of a football match between Maccabi Tel Aviv and Aston Villa, with visiting Israeli fans barred.The UK government last month vowed to reverse the ban on Maccabi fans attending the Europa League match in the city in central England that has a significant Muslim population after widespread criticism of the decision taken by local safety advisors and police.However, the Israeli club later announced it would decline any tickets for its fans, citing safety concerns.Villa have said they are not selling tickets for the vacant away end of their Villa Park stadium.Birmingham, the UK’s second-largest city, has been the scene of regular pro-Palestinian rallies over the last two years.Close to Villa’s stadium on Thursday there was a large, visible police presence, an AFP correspondent saw.Local police said protests by different groups were scheduled Thursday near Villa Park, including a pro-Palestinian demonstration demanding Israel be excluded from international football.A pro-Israeli group has also organised a Maccabi Solidarity Rally, with both protests set to kick off around 6:00 pm (1800 GMT), two hours before the match is due to begin.”We are experienced at policing high-profile football matches and demonstrations, and for many weeks now, we have been working closely with different faith and local community groups to listen to their views and concerns,” West Midlands Police said in statement.Signs had been hung near the stadium reading “no war games allowed” and “Give Zionism the Red Card”, while channels spearheaded by far-right activist Tommy Robinson have made Islamophobic statements about the match and planned protests.One school near the stadium confirmed to AFP it was closing early to avoid disruption, with others reportedly planning to do the same.- ‘High risk’ -Police have classified the fixture as “high risk”, citing “violent clashes and hate crime offences” during a Europa League match in Amsterdam between Maccabi and local team Ajax last November.That game sparked two days of clashes between locals and Israeli fans in the Dutch city.But ahead of Thursday’s match things were calm in Birmingham.Residents Michael Harrison, 38, and Lisa Evans, 47, working at a small business near Villa Park, were not worried about possible protests.Harrison said Israeli fans should have been given tickets to attend the match.”The game, it’s about bringing people together,” he said, adding he understood the fears but the fans could have been searched properly.Maccabi Tel Aviv’s decision to turn down tickets also came after Israeli police called off an Israeli Premier League match between the club and city rivals Hapoel because of “riots” between rival fans.The team has insisted its supporters were not involved in the unrest and criticised “hate-filled falsehoods” about its supporters for creating a “toxic atmosphere”.Aston Villa have urged supporters not to display political symbols during the match — a practice banned under protocols issued by UEFA, the governing body of European football.Ayoub Khan, the independent MP for the area covering Villa Park who was elected last year on a pro-Palestinian ticket, said there was a “large concentration of Muslims” in the local area who had voiced fears about racism.

Hezbollah lashed out on Thursday against the prospect of any political negotiations between Lebanon and Israel, and insisted that it has a right to defend itself.A source close to Hezbollah’s political leadership told AFP the declaration followed recent US and Egyptian pressure on Lebanon’s leaders to open direct negotiations.Lebanon and Israel are still technically in a state of war, but all the recent armed conflicts with Israel were fought by Hezbollah, not the Lebanese military.On Thursday, an Israeli strike killed one person, according to the Lebanese health ministry. The Israeli military said it had targeted a Hezbollah construction team. The only diplomatic contact between Israel and Lebanon is through a ceasefire monitoring mechanism, which includes the United States, France and the United Nations.This body meets regularly at the headquarters of the UN force in southern Lebanon but the Lebanese and Israeli parties do not directly communicate with each other. – Disarmament drive -Hezbollah was the only movement in Lebanon that refused to disarm after the 1975-1990 civil war, first claiming it had a duty to liberate territory occupied by Israel, and then to continue defending the country.In an open letter to the Lebanese people and their leaders, Hezbollah said it rejected “any political negotiations” between Lebanon and Israel and that such talks would “not serve the national interest”.Hezbollah is backed by Iran, which also fought its own war against Israel earlier this year.”We reaffirm our legitimate right… to defend ourselves against an enemy that imposes war on our country and does not cease its attacks,” Hezbollah added.The group nevertheless said it remained committed to a ceasefire reached with Israel last year, after months of hostilities that escalated into an all-out war.Israel warned last week that it could intensify operations in Lebanon against Hezbollah, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused the group of trying to rearm.Last week, US envoy Tom Barrack said that dialogue with Israel could be the key to easing tensions.The Lebanese government is due to meet later Thursday to examine the progress of its efforts to disarm the militant group.Despite the November 2024 ceasefire agreement that ended the latest war, Israel maintains troops in five areas in southern Lebanon and has kept up strikes.Since the ceasefire, the United States has increased pressure on Lebanese authorities to disarm the group, a move opposed by Hezbollah and its allies.- ‘Hasty decision’ -Israel has stepped up its strikes on Lebanon in recent weeks, usually saying it is targeting Hezbollah positions.President Joseph Aoun has criticised Israel for intensifying its strikes after he said he was open to negotiating with Israel. A Lebanese official told AFP on Thursday that Israel has not responded “positively nor negatively” to the offer. The Lebanese government has ordered the army to devise a plan to disarm Hezbollah, but last week Israel’s Defence Minister Israel Katz accused Aoun of “dragging his feet”.”The Lebanese government’s commitment to disarm Hezbollah and remove it from southern Lebanon must be implemented. Maximum enforcement will continue and even intensify — we will not allow any threat to the residents of the north,” he said.Netanyahu meanwhile accused Hezbollah of attempting to rearm, after it suffered staggering losses in its last war with Israel.In September 2024, Israel killed the group’s longtime chief, Hassan Nasrallah and over the course of the war took out many other senior leaders.Under the terms of the ceasefire, the army is tasked with ensuring Hezbollah is disarmed in the south near the Israeli border by the end of the year, before proceeding to its disarmament in the rest of Lebanon.Hezbollah has criticised the government’s “hasty decision” to disarm it, claiming that Israel has taken advantage of the push.

In his workshop near the Syrian capital, Ghassan Aama is at a loss following a recent decision to massively hike electricity prices, even as much of the country continues to face extensive outages.Last month, the energy ministry raised prices by at least 60 times compared to the previous tariff, sending shockwaves through a population already reeling from decades of sanctions and 14 years of war.”We were surprised to see electricity prices rise, as our income is limited,” said Aama, a blacksmith.”If the bills are high, we might not be able to make ends meet,” he added.Aama already pays a subscription to a private generator so he can run his workshop — a common practice in the country’s whose electricity sector has been ravaged by the civil war, with power cuts reaching up to 20 hours a day.”We are coming out of a war, and our homes are destroyed… we were hoping things would get better, not worse,” he added.- Liberalisation -Since the toppling of longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad in December, Syria has slowly begun to emerge from decades of political and economic isolation. The new Islamist authorities are hoping to attract funding and investments for reconstruction, which the World Bank estimated could cost more than $216 billion.The government’s decision to hike tariffs is part of a policy of liberalisation that the government seems to have adopted at the start of the year, said Jihad Yazigi, editor of economic publication The Syria Report.”What they are doing, basically, is just trying to cut costs and to remove subsidies,” he added.Contrary to what Assad claimed, Yazigi said the Syrian economy was “obviously not a socialist economy”. It was “relatively liberal… and here (they) are liberalising further”, he said, as they also lifted subsidies on bread earlier this year.- ‘No one will pay’ -But having born the brunt of the country’s crippled economy for years, Syrians are struggling to accept yet another blow. “After liberation, we expected people to return and reconstruction to take place quickly,” said Muhieddine Salam, a real estate agent.”Now, if rent is $200 and the electricity tariff is between $200 and $400, what will I do?”Vendor Alaa Mussa shared his frustration, arguing that “no one will pay, no one has the money”. “Let them turn the electricity off, it would be better,” she told AFP.”There are no jobs, and all factories are closed… (At first) everyone was happy, we thought money would start coming in, but no one expected this to happen.”Syria previously announced major investment agreements with countries in the region to rebuild infrastructure.It also announced major agreements with Qatar and Turkey to supply it with gas for electricity production.But these projects have yet to make a dent in the daily lives of Syrians.Nine out of 10 people in the country live in poverty, and one in four is unemployed, according to the United Nations.Many of them resort to informal, temporary jobs to survive, like Umm al-Zein, 43, who sells bread on the street.”I can barely afford to pay my son’s university tuition and my daughter’s private lessons for the high school exam,” she said.”The electricity barely comes on for an hour, and if the electricity doesn’t come, the water doesn’t come either.”We will be warming ourselves under blankets in the winter.”

A French-British investigation into alleged bribery at France-based defence giant Thales is examining a contract with Indonesia, an AFP investigation has showed.In November last year, Britain’s Serious Fraud Office (SFO) said it had launched a joint investigation with its French counterparts into “suspected bribery and corruption” at the multinational, which denies any wrongdoing.A 41-year-old management controller, who worked at the company between August 2018 and June 2023, was the whistleblower who alerted the authorities and caused the probe to be opened, according to two sources following the case who requested not to be named because not allowed to speak to the press.The former member of staff, who wishes to remain anonymous and who AFP reached through his lawyer, said he started asking colleagues questions after he noticed suspicious orders on the margins of big air defence deals with Indonesia and Saudi Arabia.He said that in late 2018 he noticed a curious payment order for a service worth £400,000 ($520,000 at today’s rate) on the sidelines of a deal between Thales UK and Indonesia.He said he grew suspicious when someone asked him for a retroactive approval of the order with incoherent documents produced after it was made, and reported this to his superiors.”The only thing I was told was to keep quiet,” he said.He alleged that months later, he noticed another £100,000 transferred to Saudi Arabia, where a contract had also been signed.He said he alerted colleagues in writing and orally, then via an internal complaint platform in 2022.He believes this is why he was fired.- Multiple probes -Thales told AFP the former employee only filed an internal complaint “several hours after being summoned to a meeting towards a possible dismissal for professional incompetence”.A team of in-house auditors led an internal probe and concluded that there were no grounds to his allegations, it said, adding however that it was cooperating with the British and French authorities.Neither the SFO nor the French financial prosecutor’s office wished to comment on an ongoing investigation.One source following the case said the Indonesian contract was being investigated in the joint probe.But no source confirmed or denied that any Saudi contract was also being examined.A judicial source, also wishing to remain anonymous, said the French investigators were looking at an “arms market” in Asia, without saying which country was involved.The French judiciary is looking into at least five other cases of alleged graft involving the defence firm.An investigating magistrate is investigating the sale of submarines to Malaysia in 2002 and could order a trial against parties including the firm.Four other preliminary probes, launched between 2016 and 2023, are looking at alleged corruption in places including Brazil, India and the United Nations. No charges have been pressed against Thales in those investigations.Thales told AFP the probes were ongoing and that it “strictly follows national and international regulation”.