LONDON (AP) — Days after professing his “love” and “respect” for Pep Guardiola, Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta has spoken in an equally effusive manner about another influential Spanish coach he will face in the Champions League on Tuesday.
Luis Enrique takes his Paris Saint-Germain team to Emirates Stadium for the most high-profile fixture in the second round of games in the new-look competition.
Arteta and Enrique go way back, having been together at Barcelona in the late 1990s and early 2000s when Arteta was starting out his professional career and Enrique was coming toward the end of his.
Arteta said he “learnt a lot of things” from Enrique as a player and now as a coach, saying Monday his compatriot “brings a smile on my face.”
“I am a huge admirer of him,” Arteta said. “I remember his personality, huge character, huge energy, very supportive of his young players. What I love about him is that wherever he has been, as a player or as a manager, his fingerprints are all over place. You can see it’s his team. You can see PSG is his team.
“He has this unbelievable power … Then there’s his approach to life, his profession — it’s something to really look at and I learnt a lot of things from him.”
Arteta spent much of last week talking about Guardiola and Manchester City amid the fallout from Arsenal’s feisty 2-2 draw at the Premier League champions that appears to have ignited a rivalry between the teams.
He has long been viewed as a protégé of Guardiola, yet it seems that Enrique has been an influence, too.
“I love his honesty — he is very straightforward, he looks you in the eyes and tells you what he thinks,” Arteta said. “I think in the end, players appreciate that.”
Arteta described PSG, where he enjoyed a spell on loan in 2000-01 alongside players like Ronaldinho and Nicolas Anelka, as a team “probably at the highest level you can find in European football.”
Enrique’s side leads the French league with five wins and a draw from the opening six games of its title defense and began the Champions League with a 1-0 win over Girona — albeit courtesy of a 90th-minute own-goal.
Arsenal started with a 0-0 draw at Atalanta.
Arteta said Arsenal will check on the fitness of fullbacks Ben White and Riccardo Calafiori on Monday.
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PSG's head coach Luis Enrique gives instructions during the Champions League opening phase soccer match between Paris Saint-Germain and Girona at the Parc des Princes stadium in Paris, France, Wednesday, Sept. 18, 2024. (AP Photo/Christophe Ena)
Arsenal's manager Mikel Arteta reacts during the English Premier League soccer match between Arsenal and Leicester City at the Emirates Stadium in London, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Ian Walton)
Arsenal's manager Mikel Arteta gestures after the English League Cup third round soccer match between Arsenal and Bolton Wanderers at the Emirates stadium in London, Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth)
An Israeli airstrike hit an apartment in a multistory building in central Beirut, killing three Palestinian militants, as Hezbollah's acting leader promised the group will fight on following the death of its long-time head Hassan Nasrallah.
The early Monday airstrike — the first to hit central Beirut in nearly a year of conflict — killed three members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a small, leftist faction. Videos showed ambulances and a crowd gathered near the building in a mainly Sunni district with a busy thoroughfare lined with shops.
Separately, an Israeli airstrike early Monday killed six people, including two sisters and a child, in central Gaza, Palestinian officials said.
In the past week, Israel has frequently targeted Beirut’s southern suburbs, where Hezbollah has a strong presence — including a major strike on Friday that killed Nasrallah — but had not hit locations near the city center.
Hezbollah's acting leader Naim Kassem said in a televised statement that if Israel decides to launch a ground offensive, the group’s fighters are ready — noting that the commanders killed have already been replaced.
The Lebanese Health Ministry said at least 105 people were killed around the country in airstrikes on Sunday. Two strikes near the southern city of Sidon, about 45 kilometers (28 miles) south of Beirut, killed at least 32 people, the ministry said. Separately, Israeli strikes in the northern province of Baalbek Hermel killed 21 people and wounded at least 47.
Lebanese media reported dozens of strikes in the central, eastern and western Bekaa and in the south, besides strikes on Beirut. Israel says it targets militants, but the strikes have hit buildings where civilians were living and the death toll was expected to rise.
Here is the latest:
TEL AVIV — Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on Monday hinted at Israeli preparations for a ground offensive in Lebanon.
Speaking to troops of the 188 Armored brigade and the Golani Infantry brigade on the northern border, Gallant said, “The elimination of Nasrallah is a very important step, but it is not everything. We will use all the capabilities we have.”
He added, “If someone on the other side did not understand what the capabilities mean, it is all capabilities, and you are part of this effort.”
Israeli airstrike kills 6 people, including 2 sisters and a child, in Gaza
DEIR -AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — Palestinian medical officials say an Israeli airstrike killed six people, including two sisters and a child, in central Gaza.
The strike early Monday hit a family home in the urban Nuseirat refugee camp, according to the Awda hospital, where the casualties were taken.
The dead include a man, his two daughters and a grandchild, according to the hospital records.
Earlier on Monday, an Israeli strike hit a house in the central town of Deir al-Balah, killing two children and their parents.
Israel says it only targets militants and blames civilian casualties on Hamas because the militant group operates in residential areas. The military rarely comments on individual strikes, which often kill women and children.
Gaza’s Health Ministry says at least 41,615 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the start of the war. It does not distinguish between militants and civilians but says women and children make up a little more than half of the fatalities.
The war began on Oct. 7, when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Yemen’s Houthi rebels claim they shot down another American-made MQ-9 Reaper drone over the country, with videos purportedly showing a surface-to-air missile striking it. The U.S. military did not immediately acknowledge losing any aircraft.
The claimed attack comes as the one-year anniversary of the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip approaches. The Houthis have targeted ships traveling through the Red Sea over the war as U.S.-led airstrikes pound their positions in Yemen. That’s imperiled a waterway that typically sees $1 trillion of trade pass through it, as well as crucial shipments of aid to war-torn Sudan and Yemen.
The Houthis also continue to launch missiles targeting Israel, drawing retaliatory airstrikes from the Israelis this weekend on the port city of Hodeida.
The Houthi-run broadcaster Al-Masirah claimed shooting down the MQ-9, hours after video footage circulated online showing the purported missile striking the aircraft over Yemen’s Saada province. A single image online also appeared to show wreckage of the drone, with pieces resembling that of an MQ-9.
BEIRUT — Hezbollah’s deputy leader vowed to continue fighting Israel and said the militant group was prepared for a long war after much of its top command was wiped out, including its leader, Hassan Nasrallah.
In his first speech since Nasrallah was killed, Naim Kassem said in a televised statement Monday that if Israel decides to launch a ground offensive, Hezbollah fighters are ready to fight and defend Lebanon.
As deputy secretary-general, Naim Kassem now is the acting leader of Hezbollah until a replacement for Nasrallah is chosen.
Kassem added that despite the killing of Hezbollah’s top military commanders over the past months, Hezbollah is relying on new commanders.
“Israel was not able to affect our (military) capabilities,” Kassem said. “There are deputy commanders and there are replacements in case a commander is wounded in any post.”
PARIS — France has delivered 12 tons of medical aid to Lebanon, including two mobile clinics that will be able to treat 1,000 seriously injured people currently in hospitals’ emergency wards across the country, according to a statement from the French Foreign Ministry on Monday.
French military aircraft also delivered critical supplies of medicine to Lebanese emergency, pediatric and general hospitals and clinics, which have been overwhelmed with thousands of injured people since Israel’s bombardment of the country began over a week ago.
During his visit to Beirut on Monday, France’s Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot said that Paris is also releasing 10 million euros ($11.1 million) in emergency humanitarian aid to support the work of local humanitarian organizations, particularly the Lebanese Red Cross.
“In the face of the escalating conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, France stands by Lebanon and remains committed to protecting civilians,” the statement said.
Barrot is scheduled to meet with Lebanese leaders on Monday, including with Prime Minister Najib Mikati, Army chief Joseph Aoun and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri.
BEIRUT — Lebanese officials have asked people who lost relatives in recent Israeli airstrikes to provide DNA samples to match with unidentified remains.
Lebanon’s Internal Security Forces on Monday called on residents across the country to visit police stations with an identity card to give their samples. It said more than one person from each family should provide a sample, if possible.
A wave of Israeli airstrikes across large parts of Lebanon have killed more than 1,030 people — including 156 women and 87 children — in less than two weeks, according to Lebanon’s Health Ministry.
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Satellite images analyzed by The Associated Press show the site of the Israeli airstrike that killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.
The images, taken Sunday by Planet Labs PBC, show the site just some 2 kilometers (1.25 miles) northeast of Beirut’s Rafik Hariri International Airport.
The images show multi-story buildings at the site now cratered in the densely populated predominantly Shiite southern Beirut suburb known as Dahiyeh.
Israel said the Friday night strike targeted a meeting at an underground Hezbollah compound located beneath the towers and at least one empty lot at the site.
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — Palestinian officials say an Israeli airstrike early Monday killed a family of four in central Gaza.
The strike hit a house in the central town of Deir al-Balah, according to the al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, which received the bodies.
The dead included two children and their parents, according to hospital records. An Associated Press reporter counted the bodies at the hospital morgue.
Israel says it only targets militants and accuses Hamas fighters of hiding among civilians, putting them in danger. It rarely comments on individual strikes, which often kill women and children.
The war began on Oct. 7, when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians.
BEIRUT — The Palestinian militant group Hamas says one of its commanders has been killed in an Israeli airstrike in Lebanon.
Fatah Sharif was killed early Monday in an airstrike on the Al-Buss refugee camp in the southern port city of Tyre, the group said in a statement. His wife, son and daughter were also killed in the strike, it said.
Sharif was a commander in Lebanon and a member of Hamas’ command outside the Palestinian territories, Hamas said.
Since the Israel-Hamas war began on Oct. 7, Israeli airstrikes have killed several Hamas officials in Lebanon.
This satellite image from Planet Labs PBC shows the site of an Israeli airstrike that killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut, Lebanon, Sunday, Sept. 29, 2024. (Planet Labs PBC via AP)
A man passes by a damaged car where an Israeli airstrike hit a nearby building in Beirut, Lebanon, early Monday, Sept. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Damaged apartments, right, are seen in a building that was hit by Israeli strike, in Beirut, Lebanon, early Monday, Sept. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Damaged cars are parked in front of a building that was hit by an Israeli airstrike early Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Beirut, Lebanon. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Yemenis stand in front of a portrait of Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, in Sanaa, Yemen, Saturday, Sept. 28, 2024. (AP Photo/Osamah Abdulrahman)
A large fire and plume of smoke is visible in the port city of Hodeida, Yemen, on Sunday, Sept. 29, 2024, after Israeli strikes on the Houthi-controlled city. (AP Photo)
A Lebanese policeman looks at damaged apartments that were hit by Israeli strike early Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Beirut, Lebanon. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
People look up at a damaged building that was hit by Israeli strike early Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Beirut, Lebanon. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
People walk past damaged cars near a building hit by an Israeli airstrike early Monday, Sept. 30, 2024, in Beirut, Lebanon. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Policemen and civil defense workers stand next to damaged cars near a building that was hit in an Israeli airstrike, in Beirut, Lebanon, early Monday, Sept. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Policemen and civil defense workers inspect a damaged car near a building that was hit in an Israeli airstrike, in Beirut, Lebanon, early Monday, Sept. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Women pass the damaged cars where an Israeli airstrike hit a building in Beirut early Monday, Sept. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
A damaged apartment is seen on a building that was hit by Israeli strike, in Beirut early Monday, Sept. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Damages are seen on a building that was hit by Israeli strike, early Monday, Sept. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
A Lebanese soldier passes next to damaged cars where an Israeli airstrike hit a building in Beirut early Monday, Sept. 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
