Turkiye widens probe into building collapses as quake toll exceeds 50,000

Perihan Fansa and Ayfer Sarac sit outside a destroyed building while waiting for their brother to take furniture out of his apartment in the aftermath of the deadly earthquake in Antakya, Hatay province on Feb. 20, 2023. (Reuters)
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Updated 25 February 2023
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Turkiye widens probe into building collapses as quake toll exceeds 50,000

  • Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag said that more than 600 people had been investigated in connection with collapsed buildings
  • Those formally arrested and remanded in custody include 79 construction contractors, 74 people who bear legal responsibility for buildings, 13 property owners and 18 people who had made alterations to buildings

ANTAKYA/ISTANBUL: Turkiye has arrested 184 people suspected of responsibility for the collapse of buildings in this month’s earthquakes and investigations are widening, a minister said on Saturday, as anger simmers over what many see as corrupt building practices.
Overnight, the death toll from the earthquakes, the most powerful of which struck at the dead of night on Feb. 6, rose to 44,128 in Turkiye. That took the overall number of deaths in Turkiye and neighboring Syria to more than 50,000.
More than 160,000 buildings containing 520,000 apartments collapsed or were severely damaged in Turkiye by the disaster, the worst in the country’s modern history.
Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag said that more than 600 people had been investigated in connection with collapsed buildings, speaking during a news conference in the southeastern city of Diyarbakir, which was among 10 provinces hit by the disaster.
Those formally arrested and remanded in custody include 79 construction contractors, 74 people who bear legal responsibility for buildings, 13 property owners and 18 people who had made alterations to buildings, he said.
Many Turks have expressed outrage at what they see as corrupt building practices and flawed urban developments.
President Tayyip Erdogan, who faces the biggest political challenge of his two-decade rule in elections scheduled to be held by June, has promised accountability.
In the province of Gaziantep, the mayor of the Nurdagi district — who is from Erdogan’s ruling AK Party — was among those arrested as part of the investigations into collapsed buildings, state broadcaster TRT Haber and other media reported.

’BREAKING MY HEART’
Nearly three weeks since the disaster, there is no final death toll in Turkiye and officials have not said how many bodies may still be trapped under the rubble.
A firefighter helping to clear the rubble in the hard-hit city of Antakya said body parts were being found on a daily basis.
“It’s very difficult. You cannot tell a man to continue working if he’s lifting out a person’s arm,” said the firefighter, who declined to be identified.
Nearly two million people left homeless by the disaster are being housed in tents, container homes and other facilities in the region and in other parts of the country, Turkiye’s disaster management authority said.
More than 335,000 tents have been erected in the quake zone and container home settlements are being established at 130 locations, while nearly 530,000 people have been evacuated from affected areas, it added.
But near Antakya, Omran Alswed, a Syrian, and his family are still living in makeshift shelters.
“Our houses are heavily damaged so we have taken shelter here, in a garden in our neighborhood,” said Alswed.
“The biggest issue is tents. It has been 19 days and we are yet to receive a single tent. We also applied to move into a tent camp but they said the ones nearby are full,” he said.
Turkiye’s only remaining ethnic Armenian village, Vakifli, was badly hit by the quake, with 30 of its 40 stone houses heavily damaged.
“Vakifli is all we have, the only Armenian village in Turkiye. It is our home. Seeing it like this is breaking my heart,” said Masis, a 67-year-old retired jeweller, who moved back to his hometown after spending 17 years in Istanbul.
Turkiye and Armenia are still at odds over the 1.5 million people Armenia says were killed in 1915 by the Ottoman Empire, the predecessor to modern Turkiye. Armenia says this constitutes genocide.
Turkiye accepts that many Armenians living in the Ottoman Empire were killed in clashes with Ottoman forces during World War One, but contests the figures and denies it was systematic.


Israeli authorities arrest four Al-Aqsa guards, storm old prayer hall

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Israeli authorities arrest four Al-Aqsa guards, storm old prayer hall

  • Israeli forces storm prayer hall beneath the Qibli Mosque, damaging its contents
  • Jerusalem Governorate says action is part of efforts to assert control over the mosque’s administration and undermine the Waqf authority

LONDON: Israeli authorities arrested four guards at the Al-Aqsa Mosque during a search raid on Saturday night inside the compound’s old prayer hall.

The Jerusalem Governorate, affiliated with the Palestinian Authority, said that the detainees were identified as Mohammad Arbash, Ramzi Al-Zaanin, Basem Abu Juma, and Iyad Odeh. Several other guards and a firefighter in the compound were interrogated at the site by Israelis, the Wafa news agency reported.

Just after midnight on Saturday, Israeli forces stormed the old prayer hall at Al-Aqsa, a subterranean area beneath the Qibli Mosque, damaging its contents after breaking into storage cabinets and searching the premises, Wafa added.

The governorate said the latest Israeli action was part of efforts to assert control over the mosque’s administration and undermine the authority of the Islamic Waqf Department in Jerusalem.

After less than a week of complete closure under a state of emergency linked to the ongoing war with Iran, the Al-Aqsa Mosque was reopened by Israeli authorities, allowing Palestinian and other Muslim worshippers to enter the site under strict regulations, Wafa reported.


Palestinian Authority considers phasing out shekel as Israeli banks refuse to accept surplus

Updated 22 June 2025
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Palestinian Authority considers phasing out shekel as Israeli banks refuse to accept surplus

  • Israeli banks’ refusal to accept the transfer of surplus shekels means fewer foreign currencies that are necessary for commerce and business
  • Israel’s finance minister in June ended a waiver that allowed Israeli banks to engage with Palestinian ones without being scrutinized for money laundering and financing extremism

LONDON: The Palestinian Authority is considering replacing the Israeli shekel as the primary currency in circulation due to its increasing accumulation in the banks.

The Palestine Monetary Authority announced on Sunday that it has taken significant steps to address the growing accumulation of shekels in Palestinian banks after Israeli banks’ continuing refusal to accept the transfer of surplus shekels in exchange for foreign currencies necessary for commerce and business.

The PMA is considering alternative options, including a shift away from using the shekel as the primary currency in circulation, the Wafa news agency reported.

In early June, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich ended a waiver that allowed Israeli banks to engage with Palestinian banks without being scrutinized for money laundering and financing extremism.

Smotrich, who has been outspoken about weakening the Palestinian Authority and opposes the establishment of a Palestinian state, made this decision shortly after being sanctioned by the UK and four European countries for inciting violence in the occupied West Bank.

The PMA said it aims to create a more resilient and sustainable digital economy in Palestine and has consulted various economic sectors and the Union of Chambers of Commerce, Industry, and Agriculture before it makes a final decision. Alongside phasing out the Israeli shekel, the PMA studied digital payment strategies to avoid shekel accumulation in Palestinian banks, Wafa reported.


How many hostages are left in Gaza?

Updated 22 June 2025
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How many hostages are left in Gaza?

  • 50 hostages remain in captivity
  • PM Netanyahu said Israel is committed to returning the remaining hostages even as it wages a new military campaign against Iran

Israel said Sunday that it has recovered the bodies of three more hostages taken in Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack that ignited the ongoing 20-month war in the Gaza Strip.
The Israeli military identified them as Yonatan Samerano, 21; Ofra Keidar, 70; and Shay Levinson, 19. All three were killed during the initial attack and their bodies were taken into Gaza. Kobi Samerano said in a Facebook post that his son’s remains were returned on what would have been Yonatan’s 23rd birthday.
The military did not provide details about the operation. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel is committed to returning the remaining hostages even as it wages a new military campaign against Iran.
Hamas-led militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took 251 hostages in the Oct. 7 attack. More than 55,000 Palestinians in Gaza, mostly women and children, have been killed in the ensuing conflict, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. The ministry doesn’t distinguish between civilians and combatants.
Here are details on the hostages:
Total hostages captured on Oct. 7, 2023: 251
Hostages taken before the Oct. 7 attack: 4, including 2 who entered Gaza in 2014 and 2015 and the bodies of 2 soldiers killed in the 2014 war
Hostages released in exchanges or other deals: 148, of whom 8 were dead
Bodies of hostages retrieved by Israeli forces: 49
Hostages rescued alive: 8
Hostages still in captivity: 50, of whom Israel believes 27 are dead. Netanyahu has said there are “doubts” about the fate of several more.
The hostages in captivity include four non-Israelis: 2 Thais and 1 Tanzanian who have been confirmed dead, and a Nepalese captive.


US, Israel crossed ‘big red line’, Iran FM says as heads to Moscow

Updated 22 June 2025
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US, Israel crossed ‘big red line’, Iran FM says as heads to Moscow

  • ‘Through this action, the United States has dealt a serious blow to international peace and security’
  • Iran’s top envoy says any demand to return to negotiations was ‘irrelevant’

ISTANBUL: The United States and Israel crossed a major red line in attacking Iran’s nuclear facilities, Iran’s top diplomat warned Sunday, saying he was heading to Russia for talks with President Vladimir Putin.

“They crossed a very big red line by attacking (Iran’s) nuclear facilities,” Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said on the sidelines of a meeting of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in Istanbul.

He was speaking just hours after President Donald Trump said US warplanes struck three Iranian nuclear sites, nine days into an Israeli bombing campaign targeting its nuclear facilities.

“The most dangerous one happened only last night,” Araghchi said, while acknowledging he did not know the full extent of the damage done in the strikes, including one at the underground uranium enrichment facility at Fordo.

“I still do not have exact information about the level of damages, but I don’t think it matters... Last night’s attack was a grave crime,” he said.

“Through this action, the United States has dealt a serious blow to international peace and security,” he said, vowing that Iran would defend itself “by all means necessary against... US military aggression.”

Araghchi said he would head to Moscow on Sunday and hold talks with Putin on Monday morning.

“I’m going to Moscow this afternoon” to hold “serious consultations with the Russian president tomorrow,” he said.

After the strikes, Trump said Iran “must now agree to end this war.”

But Araghchi said any demand to return to negotiations was “irrelevant.”

“The world must not forget that it was the United States which — in the midst of a process to forge a diplomatic outcome — betrayed diplomacy by supporting the genocidal Israeli regime’s launch of an illegal war of aggression on the Iranian nation,” he said.

“So we were in diplomacy, but we were attacked... They have proved that they are not men of diplomacy, and they only understand the language of threat and force.”

Turkiye, which was hosting the weekend OIC summit, warned that the strikes risked escalating the Iran-Israel conflict to a global level that could have “catastrophic” consequences.

“The ongoing developments could cause the regional conflict to escalate to a global level. We do not want this catastrophic scenario to come to life,” the foreign ministry said in a statement.


Iran missile barrage hits three areas in Israel, 23 hurt

Updated 22 June 2025
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Iran missile barrage hits three areas in Israel, 23 hurt

  • Public broadcaster KAN 11 showed images of a devastated building surrounded by mounds of rubble

JERUSALEM: Three areas of Israel including coastal hub Tel Aviv were hit Sunday morning during waves of Iranian missile attacks, with at least 23 people injured, according to rescue services and police.

Several buildings were heavily damaged in the Ramat Aviv area in Tel Aviv, with holes torn in the facades of apartment blocks.

“Houses here were hit very, very badly,” Tel Aviv mayor Ron Huldai told reporters at the scene. “Fortunately, one of them was slated for demolition and reconstruction, so there were no residents inside.

“Those who were in the shelter are all safe and well. The damage is very, very extensive, but in terms of human life, we are okay.”

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The Israeli police said in a statement that they had been deployed to at least two other impact sites, one in Haifa in the north and another in Ness Ziona, south of Tel Aviv.

A public square in a residential area of Haifa was left strewn with rubble and surrounding shops and homes have been heavily damaged, AFP photos showed.

Eli Bin, the head of Israeli rescue service Magen David Adom, told reporters that a total of 23 people had been wounded nationwide in the attacks, with “two in moderate condition and the rest lightly injured.”

Two waves of missiles were launched at Israel from around 7:30 am (0430 GMT), the Israeli military said.

Sirens rang across the country, with air defenses activated shortly afterwards, causing loud explosions heard in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.

Israeli police reported “the fall of weapon fragments” in a northern area encompassing the port of Haifa, where local authorities said emergency services were heading to an “accident site.”

Reporting on missile strikes is subject to strict military censorship rules in Israel, but at least 50 impacts have been officially acknowledged nation-wide and 25 people have been killed since the war began with Iran on June 13, according to official figures.

Tel Aviv, the southern city of Beersheba and the northern port of Haifa have been the three areas most frequently targeted by Iran.

Israel’s sophisticated air defenses have intercepted more than 450 missiles along with around 1,000 drones, according to the latest figures from the Israeli military.