Dubai, Oct 25 (AP) Saudi Arabia reopened its main airport for international flights, more than two weeks after deadly strikes by Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthi rebels knocked the facility out of service. Earlier Sunday, the kingdom said it intercepted and destroyed a ballistic missile and a drone fired by the Houthis.
Meanwhile, Israel pressed ahead with a broad military operation in the occupied West Bank in response to an attack that killed two Israeli soldiers and wounded three in the city of Hebron on Friday. It comes just days ahead of Israel’s tense election on Tuesday.
The vote is widely seen as a referendum on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s leadership and security policies during the past three years of war.
Here is the latest news from the Middle East on Sunday. Read our full coverage here.
Tens of thousands of Israelis living abroad are to fly home for a pivotal election
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The AID Coalition, a US-based nonprofit focused on strengthening Israel’s democracy, says tens of thousands of Israelis living abroad are expected to fly in for the vote.
Israeli law generally requires citizens to vote in person in the country, with narrow exceptions for diplomats and certain official emissaries abroad.
Israel has more than 7.3 million registered voters, but polling suggests a tight race. Previous elections have turned on thin margins. It’s unclear what effect these voters from abroad might have, but many liberal Israelis who don’t support Netanyahu have left the country in recent years, suggesting that those returning to cast ballots would not support him.
Iran’s foreign minister dismisses threats of a flare-up in the war
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Iran’s foreign minister vowed on Sunday that new threats of war will not budge Iran from its policies.
“Today, again war is being spoken about, but I am thinking about post-war status, whether a war occurs or not, our policies will remain in place,” Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told a group of diplomats in Tehran.
He also warned the US against renewing strikes on Iran and repeated past statements that Tehran is ready to cooperate with neighbouring Arab nations in the Persian Gulf.
“Everything has changed in our region,” he said. “After the recent war, nothing will be like the past.”
A Libyan leader rejects Trump’s disparaging comments
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The head of one of Libya’s rival governments rejected comments by US President Donald Trump in which he added the North African nation to a list of countries he described as “terror-infested.”
Writing on social media, Prime Minister Abdulhamid Dbeibah said he rejected “any affront” to his country or its people “who have made great sacrifices in the fight against terrorism.”
At a campaign rally in Georgia on Saturday, Trump accused the Democrats of trying to open the United States to “armies of migrants from terror-infested countries like Libya, Yemen, Haiti, Somalia.”
Libya plunged into chaos following a NATO-backed uprising turned civil war that toppled longtime dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. The country is divided between rival administrations, each backed by different armed groups and foreign governments.
(PTI News)
