��������

BEIRUT: Syria’s foreign minister arrived in Lebanon’s capital on Friday in what observers say could mark a breakthrough in relations between the two neighbors, which have been tense for decades.
Foreign Minister Asaad Al-Shibani held talks with his Lebanese counterpart and is expected to meet with President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam. It was the first high-profile Syrian visit to Lebanon since insurgent groups overthrew President Bashar Assad’s government in early December 2024.
Lebanon and Syria have been working to rebuild strained ties, focusing on the status of roughly 2,000 Syrian nationals detained in Lebanese prisons, border security, locating Lebanese nationals missing in Syria for years and facilitating the return of Syrian refugees.
The current Syrian leadership resents Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah group for taking part in Syria’s civil war, fighting alongside Assad’s forces, while many Lebanese still grudge Syria’s 29-year domination of its smaller neighbor, where it had a military presence for three decades until 2005.
Following their meeting, Al-Shibani and Lebanese Foreign Minister Joe Rajji announced at a news conference that the Lebanese-Syrian Higher Council has been suspended and all dealings will be restricted to official diplomatic channels.
Created in 1991, the council symbolized Syria’s influence over Lebanon. Its role declined after Syria’s 2005 withdrawal, the assassination of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri and the 2008 opening of the Syrian Embassy in Beirut, which marked Syria’s first official recognition of Lebanon as an autonomous state since it gained independence from France in 1943. In recent years, the council was largely inactive, with only limited contact between officials.
In early September, a Syrian delegation, which included two former Cabinet ministers and the head of Syria’s National Commission for Missing Persons, visited Beirut. Lebanon and Syria also agreed at the time to establish two committees to address outstanding key issues.
These efforts are part of a broader regional shift following Assad’s ouster and Hezbollah’s significant losses during its recent war with Israel.
Al-Shibani reiterated Syria’s “respect for Lebanon’s sovereignty,” saying Damascus seeks to “move past previous obstacles and strengthen bilateral ties.”
“My visit to Beirut is meant to reaffirm the depth of Syrian-Lebanese relations,” he said.
Many of the Syrians held in Lebanon remain in jail without trial — about 800 are detained for security-related reasons, including involvement in attacks and shootings.
Al-Shibani’s delegation included the Syria’s justice minister, Mazhar Al-Louais Al-Wais; the head of Syrian intelligence, Hussein Al-Salama; and the assistant interior minister, Maj. Gen. Abdel Qader Tahan, according to the Lebanese state-run National News Agency.
Meanwhile, Lebanon hosts an estimated 1.5 million Syrian refugees who fled the uprising-turned-civil war that erupted more than 14 years ago. Since Assad’s fall in December, around 850,000 refugees have returned to Syria from neighboring countries as of September, with the number expected to rise, according to UNHCR Deputy High Commissioner Kelly T. Clements. Lebanese authorities granted an exemption to Syrians staying illegally if they left by the end of August.
Syria’s conflict, which began in March 2011, has killed nearly 500,000 people and displaced half the country’s prewar population of 23 million. More than 5 million Syrians fled the country as refugees, most of them to neighboring countries, including Lebanon, which has the highest number of refugees per capita in the world.
Although many Syrians initially hoped for stability after Assad was ousted, sectarian killings against members of Assad’s Alawite minority sect in Syria’s coastal region in March and against the Druze minority in the southern province of Sweida in July claimed hundreds of lives and revived security concerns.
Meanwhile, the Lebanon-Syria border has long been a flashpoint for clashes, with periodic exchanges of fire and infiltration attempts, particularly in the northeastern Bekaa Valley. In March 2025, the two countries signed an agreement to demarcate the border and enhance security coordination, aiming to prevent disputes and curb smuggling and other illicit activities.
Hezbollah has been heavily involved in cross-border smuggling, primarily to move weapons and military supplies, leading to tensions and violent confrontations along the border. Syrian security forces have repeatedly intercepted Hezbollah-linked trucks carrying weapons into Lebanon.
Since the fall of Assad, two Lebanese prime ministers have visited Syria. Aoun and Syrian President Ahmad Al-Sharaa also held talks on the sidelines of an Arab summit in Egypt in March.

PRISTINA: A US peace plan has propelled former British Prime Minister Tony Blair to the forefront of efforts to end the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza. While his legacy in the Middle East is controversial, especially given his role in taking the UK to war as part of the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq, there is one place he is revered as a hero: Kosovo.
As prime minister, Blair — along with then US President Bill Clinton — played a pivotal role in putting together an international coalition that conducted airstrikes in 1999 to end Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic’s crackdown on independence-seeking ethnic Albanians in Kosovo.
Blair’s popularity in Kosovo soared in the aftermath of the war, even leading to the emergence of a new name for boys: Tonibler, the phonetic spelling of Tony Blair’s name in Albanian.
Tonibler Gashi, a 24-year-old medical student in Pristina, said he is proud of his name.
“My parents wanted to symbolize the state of gratitude and respect toward the great man who, without him … we wouldn’t be here talking Albanian in Kosovo,” he said.
But whether Blair’s success in Kosovo can be replicated in Gaza’s vastly more complex and volatile environment remains deeply contested.
The Gaza ceasefire plan
US President Donald Trump’s plan for Gaza would see Blair potentially leading a transitional international authority, the “Board of Peace,” that would be chaired by Trump himself and would govern the Palestinian territory. The proposed body would combine international expertise, technocrats, UN officials and Palestinian representatives, and would function under a UN mandate.
It aims to oversee reconstruction, security, humanitarian relief, and the groundwork for more permanent governance structures.
Criticism from Palestinians, Arab states, and international legal scholars focus on Blair’s controversial past, especially his backing of the Iraq War. They have also voiced concerns over sovereignty, citing fears that the transitional authority could sideline Palestinian agency.
In a breakthrough on Thursday, Israel and Hamas agreed to a pause in their devastating two-year war and the release of the remaining hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners.
Blair is no stranger to the Middle East. He spent eight years serving as the Mideast Quartet’s envoy, working to promote peace between Israel and the Palestinians, before stepping down in 2015. His resignation was seen as a reflection of the dire state of peace efforts that further deteriorated under Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government.
A defining moment for Kosovo in 1998-99
In Kosovo, Blair and Clinton spearheaded a 78-day NATO airstrikes campaign that forced Milosevic to pull his troops out and cede control of what was then a province of Serbia to the United Nations and NATO. More than 13,000 people, mostly ethnic Albanians, died during the 1998-99 war.
“The fight for Kosovo was not only for Kosovo but for all of us, including my own country, who believe that freedom and justice are worth standing up for and if necessary, fighting for,” Blair said in June 2024, on the 25th anniversary of the war’s end.
Many Kosovars associate Blair with military intervention that stopped mass atrocities and see him as one the strongest Western leaders advocating for political efforts for Kosovo’s plight. He is also admired for his support of Kosovo’s postwar reconstruction and institution-building.
A United Nations Mission in Kosovo, or UNMIK, first led by French diplomat Bernard Kouchner, governed Kosovo until 2008 when it declared independence. The United States and most of the West recognize Kosovo’s independence, but not Serbia or its allies Russia and China.
Some in Kosovo express admiration for Blair’s work in the Balkan country and cautious optimism that his experience might serve Gaza well.
“I would ask him to be as straightforward and as much respectful for the humanitarian cause of Gaza as he was to us,” said Gashi, the medical student named after the former British prime minister.
Bashkim Fazliu, of the We Remember Tony Blair Foundation, said that without Blair’s leadership, “we would simply disappear, vanish from Kosovo.” The foundation was created in 2023 when Blair’s statue was raised in the southern town of Ferizaj, 40 kilometers (25 miles) south of the capital Pristina.
A square in Ferizaj was also named Tony Blair.
Many streets, squares or busts have been named or raised for Clinton and then-Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, too.
“So probably this is the last piece that he wants to solve in the world. And, I believe that he can, if he will have this opportunity,” said Fazliu.
Parallels, differences, and key challenges
In both Kosovo and the proposed Gaza plan, there is strong emphasis on international involvement in stopping atrocities, protecting civilians, rebuilding infrastructure, and laying foundations for lasting governance.
Blair is, nevertheless, a polarizing figure in the Arab world. Skepticism is high about whether external leadership under him might be seen as paternalistic or as undermining Palestinian self-determination.
Vlora Citaku, a former diplomat representing Kosovo at the UN, considered Blair “the best suited person” to help lead the postwar transition in Gaza.
“Mr. Blair has something that leadership in the world today lacks and needs: courage and empathy,” she said.
Veton Surroi, a Kosovar politician who was part of the 1999 peace talks that ended the war, said Blair’s role in Gaza should resemble that of Kouchner’s in Kosovo, “as someone who continuously develops relationships within the society that will move that society toward more responsibility.”
“I wish that Tony Blair had the same depth and the same commitment in Gaza as he has had in Kosovo,” he said.