US ally Egypt is seeking guarantees from Washington that Israel will not attack exiled Hamas leaders again, sources told The National on Wednesday.
Egypt's request comes after Israel's strike on Tuesday aimed at top Hamas leaders in Qatar, which is another close Washington ally and home to the largest US military base in the Middle East.
There has been no response yet from Washington on the Egyptian request but, according to the sources, Egypt's plea stands a good chance of receiving a positive response from President Donald Trump's administration.
The White House said on Tuesday night that Mr Trump did not agree with Israel's decision to strike Hamas's exiled leaders in Qatar.
“I'm not thrilled about the whole situation,” Mr Trump told reporters separately.
“We want the [Israeli] hostages back, but we are not thrilled about the way that went down today.”
Hamas said six people were killed in the strikes, including the group's chief negotiator Khalil Al Hayah's son and aide. However, its senior leaders have survived. The sources said several Hamas leaders may have been wounded in the attack, but none seriously.
Egypt, Qatar and Turkey, a Nato member and close US ally, have in recent days discussed ways to best provide protection for Hamas's exiled leaders against possible attacks by Israel, the sources said. These discussions were prompted by intelligence reaching the three nations that Israel planned to attack senior Hamas figures in and outside Gaza as part of its war goal to wipe out the group.
As part of the talks, Egypt was considering providing a home for three or four of the group's top leaders who are involved in indirect negotiations with Israel to end the Gaza war, sources told The National.
Among the names floated for possible relocation to Cairo are senior officials Zaher Jabareen, Nazar Awadallah and Hossam Badran.
“The intention is to safeguard the negotiations at a time when Israel is sending a clear message to everyone that no one in the Arab world can stop it from doing what it pleases,” said one of the sources.
“Israel is telling everyone that there's no ceiling to what it could do.”
Egypt, Qatar and the US, have been trying without success to broker a ceasefire in Gaza since the last one collapsed in March. It was the second pause in the war that began in October 2023.
“The Gaza negotiations have been frozen,” an official who has been directly involved in the negotiations said on Wednesday. “There is no prospect at present for their resumption.”
The latest proposal for ending the war came from Mr Trump. His plan calls for Hamas to release all hostages – of whom 20 are believed to be alive and about 28 are bodies being held in Gaza – on the first day of a truce.
He also wants Hamas to surrender its arms and network of underground tunnels as well as halt the recruitment of new fighters, according to the sources.
Hamas says it will not give up its arms before Israel withdraws from Gaza, where more than 64,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel's war, according to Gaza's Health Ministry.
Moreover, Israel's strike in Qatar on Tuesday has taken place amid growing tension between Egypt and Israel, Middle East neighbours bound by a US-sponsored peace treaty signed in 1979.
Egypt's condemnation of the attack showed a marked toughening of the anti-Israel rhetoric that has intensified in recent months.
This is mostly due to Cairo's belief that Israeli policies in Gaza are designed in large part to force the enclave's estimated two million residents to seek refuge in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El Sisi, his ministers and pro-government media have recently taken to using the term “genocide” to describe Israel's war on Gaza. They have also accused Israel of deliberately starving Palestinians in the enclave.
“The perpetrators of this criminal act must be held accountable,” Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty told reporters on Tuesday night after the Qatar attack. “The arrogance of power will not bring about security to the region or to Israel itself.”
Several pro-government talk show hosts have in recent weeks been warning Israel against going to war with Egypt.
“Egypt does not favour war, but it's ready for it,” Diaa Rashwan, chairman of the State Information Service, said in a television interview last week.
“Such a war can be summed up in one phrase: Only a 100 kilometres separate Tel Aviv from Al Arish [an Egyptian city close to the Gaza border],” he said.
“By comparison, it will make the 1973 war looks like a picnic,” he added, alluding to the last of four, full-fledged wars between Egypt and Israel in which Egypt and Syria took Israel by surprise with a simultaneous attack.
The Buckingham Murders
Starring: Kareena Kapoor Khan, Ash Tandon, Prabhleen Sandhu
Director: Hansal Mehta
Rating: 4 / 5
Monster Hunter: World
Capcom
PlayStation 4, Xbox One
Infiniti QX80 specs
Engine: twin-turbocharged 3.5-liter V6
Power: 450hp
Torque: 700Nm
Price: From Dh450,000, Autograph model from Dh510,000
Available: Now
Afro%20salons
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Game Changer
Director: Shankar
Stars: Ram Charan, Kiara Advani, Anjali, S J Suryah, Jayaram
Rating: 2/5
Heavily-sugared soft drinks slip through the tax net
Some popular drinks with high levels of sugar and caffeine have slipped through the fizz drink tax loophole, as they are not carbonated or classed as an energy drink.
Arizona Iced Tea with lemon is one of those beverages, with one 240 millilitre serving offering up 23 grams of sugar - about six teaspoons.
A 680ml can of Arizona Iced Tea costs just Dh6.
Most sports drinks sold in supermarkets were found to contain, on average, five teaspoons of sugar in a 500ml bottle.
Benefits of first-time home buyers' scheme
- Priority access to new homes from participating developers
- Discounts on sales price of off-plan units
- Flexible payment plans from developers
- Mortgages with better interest rates, faster approval times and reduced fees
- DLD registration fee can be paid through banks or credit cards at zero interest rates
Our legal consultant
Name: Dr Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
How green is the expo nursery?
Some 400,000 shrubs and 13,000 trees in the on-site nursery
An additional 450,000 shrubs and 4,000 trees to be delivered in the months leading up to the expo
Ghaf, date palm, acacia arabica, acacia tortilis, vitex or sage, techoma and the salvadora are just some heat tolerant native plants in the nursery
Approximately 340 species of shrubs and trees selected for diverse landscape
The nursery team works exclusively with organic fertilisers and pesticides
All shrubs and trees supplied by Dubai Municipality
Most sourced from farms, nurseries across the country
Plants and trees are re-potted when they arrive at nursery to give them room to grow
Some mature trees are in open areas or planted within the expo site
Green waste is recycled as compost
Treated sewage effluent supplied by Dubai Municipality is used to meet the majority of the nursery’s irrigation needs
Construction workforce peaked at 40,000 workers
About 65,000 people have signed up to volunteer
Main themes of expo is ‘Connecting Minds, Creating the Future’ and three subthemes of opportunity, mobility and sustainability.
Expo 2020 Dubai to open in October 2020 and run for six months
Some of Darwish's last words
"They see their tomorrows slipping out of their reach. And though it seems to them that everything outside this reality is heaven, yet they do not want to go to that heaven. They stay, because they are afflicted with hope." - Mahmoud Darwish, to attendees of the Palestine Festival of Literature, 2008
His life in brief: Born in a village near Galilee, he lived in exile for most of his life and started writing poetry after high school. He was arrested several times by Israel for what were deemed to be inciteful poems. Most of his work focused on the love and yearning for his homeland, and he was regarded the Palestinian poet of resistance. Over the course of his life, he published more than 30 poetry collections and books of prose, with his work translated into more than 20 languages. Many of his poems were set to music by Arab composers, most significantly Marcel Khalife. Darwish died on August 9, 2008 after undergoing heart surgery in the United States. He was later buried in Ramallah where a shrine was erected in his honour.
TICKETS
Tickets start at Dh100 for adults, while children can enter free on the opening day. For more information, visit www.mubadalawtc.com.
It's up to you to go green
Nils El Accad, chief executive and owner of Organic Foods and Café, says going green is about “lifestyle and attitude” rather than a “money change”; people need to plan ahead to fill water bottles in advance and take their own bags to the supermarket, he says.
“People always want someone else to do the work; it doesn’t work like that,” he adds. “The first step: you have to consciously make that decision and change.”
When he gets a takeaway, says Mr El Accad, he takes his own glass jars instead of accepting disposable aluminium containers, paper napkins and plastic tubs, cutlery and bags from restaurants.
He also plants his own crops and herbs at home and at the Sheikh Zayed store, from basil and rosemary to beans, squashes and papayas. “If you’re going to water anything, better it be tomatoes and cucumbers, something edible, than grass,” he says.
“All this throwaway plastic - cups, bottles, forks - has to go first,” says Mr El Accad, who has banned all disposable straws, whether plastic or even paper, from the café chain.
One of the latest changes he has implemented at his stores is to offer refills of liquid laundry detergent, to save plastic. The two brands Organic Foods stocks, Organic Larder and Sonnett, are both “triple-certified - you could eat the product”.
The Organic Larder detergent will soon be delivered in 200-litre metal oil drums before being decanted into 20-litre containers in-store.
Customers can refill their bottles at least 30 times before they start to degrade, he says. Organic Larder costs Dh35.75 for one litre and Dh62 for 2.75 litres and refills will cost 15 to 20 per cent less, Mr El Accad says.
But while there are savings to be had, going green tends to come with upfront costs and extra work and planning. Are we ready to refill bottles rather than throw them away? “You have to change,” says Mr El Accad. “I can only make it available.”
KILLING OF QASSEM SULEIMANI
The five pillars of Islam
1. Fasting
2. Prayer
3. Hajj
4. Shahada
5. Zakat
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
SPECS
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Company name: baraka
Started: July 2020
Founders: Feras Jalbout and Kunal Taneja
Based: Dubai and Bahrain
Sector: FinTech
Initial investment: $150,000
Current staff: 12
Stage: Pre-seed capital raising of $1 million
Investors: Class 5 Global, FJ Labs, IMO Ventures, The Community Fund, VentureSouq, Fox Ventures, Dr Abdulla Elyas (private investment)
Sreesanth's India bowling career
Tests 27, Wickets 87, Average 37.59, Best 5-40
ODIs 53, Wickets 75, Average 33.44, Best 6-55
T20Is 10, Wickets 7, Average 41.14, Best 2-12
