RABAT: A heatwave in Morocco has killed at least 21 people in a 24-hour period in the central city of Beni Mellal, the health ministry announced on Thursday.
The meteorology department said soaring temperatures affected much of the North African country from Monday to Wednesday, reaching 48 degrees Celsius (118 Fahrenheit) in some areas.
In Beni Mellal, “the majority of deaths involved people suffering from chronic illnesses and the elderly, with high temperatures contributing to the deterioration of their health conditions,” the regional health directorate said in a statement.
The ministry was not able to immediately say if this was the highest recorded death toll from a heatwave in the country.
Beni Mellal, more than 200 kilometers (150 miles) southeast of Casablanca, was still experiencing temperatures of 43 degrees on Thursday.
Temperatures are expected to drop in the coming days, the meteorology department said. In the tourism hotspot of Marrakech, they are expected to drop by 10 degrees on Sunday.
Morocco has suffered a sixth consecutive year of drought, and record heat this past winter with January the hottest since 1940, according to the meteorology department which had recorded temperatures approaching 37C in some places.
The rising temperatures and prolonged drought, which have lowered reservoir levels, are a threat to the vital farm sector.
Water evaporation reached 1.5 million cubic meters (53 million cubic feet) per day, Water Minister Nizar Baraka said at the end of June.
The High Commission for Planning said in May that the “labor market continues to suffer from the effects of the drought” and reported that the unemployment rate had increased to 13.7 percent in the first quarter, up from 12.9 percent in the same period of last year.
Around 159,000 jobs in the agricultural sector disappeared, the figures showed.
Morocco’s record temperature — 50.4C — was set in August last year in the coastal resort city of Agadir.
Globally, Monday was the hottest day recorded since measurements began in 1940, the European Union’s Copernicus Earth observation program said.
It has previously predicted that daily records would be broken this summer in the northern hemisphere and that the planet would endure a particularly long period of intense heat due to climate change.
Scientists have linked climate change to more prolonged, stronger and more frequent extreme weather, including heatwaves.
Morocco heatwave kills more than 20 people in 24 hours
https://arab.news/vqm9d
Morocco heatwave kills more than 20 people in 24 hours
- The meteorology department said soaring temperatures affected much of the North African country from Monday to Wednesday, reaching 48 degrees Celsius
- The ministry was not able to immediately say if this was the highest recorded death toll from a heatwave in the country
US and regional countries team up to resolve the issue of Daesh prisoners in Syria
- President Trump asked the Syrian government to “assume responsibility” Daesh prisoners
- Some 9,000 Daesh prisoners are being held by the US-backed SDF in northeast Syria
ISTANBUL: Turkiye, the United States, Syria and Iraq have formed a working group to try to resolve the issue of Daesh group prisoners held in Syria, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said in comments published Thursday.
The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF, control large parts of northeast Syria bordering Turkiye and Iraq and oversee more than a dozen prison camps holding thousands of suspected Daesh — also known as Islamic State or IS — fighters and their families.
US President Donald Trump asked the Syrian government to “assume responsibility” for some 9,000 Daesh prisoners when he met Syrian President President Ahmad Al-Sharaa in Saudi Arabia on May 14.
Erdogan said a committee had been formed to work out what to do with the prisoners, particularly women and children held at refugee camps such as Al-Hol in northern Syria. His comments on the presidential website were released as he returned from a trip to Hungary.
“Iraq needs to focus on the issue of the camps,” Erdogan said. “The vast majority of women and children in the Al Hol camp in particular belong to Iraq and Syria. They should do what is necessary for them.”
In 2014, Daesh declared a caliphate in large parts of Iraq and Syria and attracted tens of thousands of supporters from around the world. The extremists were defeated by a US-led coalition in Iraq in 2017 and in Syria in 2019. Tens of thousands of people linked to the group were taken to Al-Hol camp close to the Iraqi border.
It is anticipated that the government in Damascus will take control of the prison camps, a move Erdogan said would make it easier to integrate the Kurdish forces in Syria.
Kurdish fighters in Syria have ties to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, which on May 12 agreed to dissolve and lay down its weapons following a four-decade insurgency against Turkiye.
Turkiye to provide Syria with 2 billion cubic meters of gas annually
- Deal signed to activate gas pipeline connecting Syria with Turkiye
- Turkiye will also start supplying 500 megawatts of electricity to Syria by yearend
DAMASCUS: Turkiye will provide 2 billion cubic meters of natural gas to Syria each year, Turkish energy minister Alparslan Bayraktar said on Thursday.
In a joint news conference with his Syrian counterpart in Damascus, Bayraktar said that Turkiye’s gas exports to Syria will contribute to an additional 1,300 megawatts of electricity production in the country.
Ankara, which supported rebel forces in neighboring Syria throughout the 13-year civil war that ended this month with the ousting of Bashar Assad, is now positioning itself to play a major role in Syria’s reconstruction.
Turkiye will also provide an additional 1,000 megawatts of electricity to neighboring Syria for its short term needs, he added.
Syrian Energy Minister Mohammed Al-Bashir said they agreed to activate a gas pipeline that connects Syria with Turkiye, with gas flows expected in June.
“This will significantly boost electricity generation, which will positively impact the Syrian people’s electricity needs,” Al-Bashir said.
The two minister discussed completing a 400-kilovolt line that links the countries, contributing to importing around 500 megawatts of electricity into Syria, to be ready by the end of the year or shortly thereafter, he added.
Cooperation also includes opening the door for Turkish companies to invest in mining, phosphate, electricity generation and electricity distribution in Syria.
“There is very intensive work underway regarding the discovery of new natural resources, whether gas or oil, on land or at sea,” Bayraktar said. (Reporting by Riham Alkousaa in Damascus and Huseyin Hayatsever in Ankara; Editing by Jonathan Spicer and Louise Heavens)
WHO chief begs Israel to show ‘mercy’ in Gaza
- Tedros said only a political solution could bring a meaningful peace.
GENEVA: Fighting back tears, the head of the World Health Organization on Thursday urged Israel to have “mercy” in the Gaza war and insisted peace would be in Israel’s own interests.
In an emotional intervention at the WHO annual assembly, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the war was hurting Israel and would not bring a lasting solution.
“I can feel how people in Gaza would feel at the moment. I can smell it. I can visualize it. I can hear even the sounds. And this is because of PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder),” said Tedros, 60, who has often recalled his own wartime upbringing in Ethiopia.
“You can imagine how people are suffering. It’s really wrong to weaponize food. It’s very wrong to weaponize medical supplies.”
The United Nations on Thursday began distributing around 90 truckloads of aid which are the first deliveries into Gaza since Israel imposed a total blockade on March 2.
Tedros said only a political solution could bring a meaningful peace.
“A call for peace is actually in the best interests of Israel itself. I feel that the war is hurting Israel itself and it will not bring a lasting solution,” he said.
“I ask if you can have mercy. It’s good for you and good for the Palestinians. It’s good for humanity.”
WHO emergencies director Michael Ryan said that 2.1 million people in Gaza were “in imminent danger of death.”
“We need to end the starvation, we need to release all hostages and we need to resupply and bring the health system back online,” he said.
“As an ex-hostage, I can say that all hostages should be released. Their families are suffering. Their families are in pain,” he added.
The WHO said Gazans were suffering acute shortages of food, water, medical supplies, fuel and shelter.
Four major hospitals have had to suspend medical services in the past week, due to their proximity to hostilities or evacuation zones, and attacks.
Only 19 of the Gaza Strip’s 36 hospitals remain operational, with staff working in “impossible conditions,” the UN health agency said in a statement.
“At least 94 percent of all hospitals in the Gaza Strip are damaged or destroyed,” it said, while north Gaza “has been stripped of nearly all health care.”
It said that across the Palestinian territory, only 2,000 hospital beds remained available — a figure “grossly insufficient to meet the current needs.”
“The destruction is systematic. Hospitals are rehabilitated and resupplied, only to be exposed to hostilities or attacked again. This destructive cycle must end.”
Israel PM names new security chief, defying attorney general
JERUSALEM: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced Thursday his pick for the next head of the Shin Bet domestic security agency, defying the country’s attorney general and a significant segment of the public.
“Prime Minister Netanyahu announced this evening his decision to appoint Major General David Zini as the next head of the Shin Bet,” a statement from the premier’s office said.
The decision is the latest development in a long-running controversy surrounding the role, which has seen mass protests against the incumbent chief’s dismissal, as well as against moves pushed by Netanyahu’s government to expand elected officials’ power to appoint judges.
The supreme court on Wednesday ruled the government’s decision to fire current domestic security chief Ronen Bar was “improper and unlawful.”
Netanyahu’s move to tap Zini to replace Bar directly defied Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara, who had said that, given the court ruling, the premier “must refrain from any action related to the appointment of a new head of the Shin Bet.”
Netanyahu immediately responded in a rare press conference that his government would make an appointment despite Baharav-Miara’s stance.
Following Thursday’s announcement, the attorney general released a statement saying that the prime minister was acting “contrary to legal guidance.”
“There is serious concern that he acted while in a conflict of interest, and the appointment process is flawed,” the statement said.
Zini, the son of immigrants from France and the grandson of a Holocaust survivor, has held “many” operational and command positions in the Israeli military, Thursday’s announcement said, including for some elite units and combat brigades.
The announcement comes after more than two months of political and legal wrangling over who should head the powerful agency.
In March, Netanyahu said that he was dismissing Bar due to “ongoing lack of trust.”
Israel issues evacuation warning for parts of Gaza
GAZA CITY: The Israeli army issued an evacuation warning on Thursday for 14 neighborhoods of northern Gaza, as it pressed a renewed offensive that has drawn international condemnation.
The warning came hours after the UN said it had collected and begun distributing around 90 truckloads of aid in Gaza, the first such delivery since Israel imposed a total blockade on the territory on March 2.
Under global pressure for an end to the blockade and the violence, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he was open to a “temporary ceasefire” in Gaza, but reaffirmed the military aimed to bring the entire territory under its control.
In an Arabic-language statement on Thursday, the military said it was “operating with intense force” in 14 areas in the northern Gaza Strip, accusing “terrorist organizations” of operating there.
The army issued a similar warning for northern Gaza on Wednesday evening in what the army said was a response to rocket fire.
It later announced three more launches from northern Gaza, but said the projectiles had fallen inside the Palestinian territory.
Netanyahu said it was necessary to “avoid a humanitarian crisis in order to preserve our freedom of operational action” in Gaza.
Palestinians have been scrambling for basic supplies, with Israel’s blockade leading to critical food and medicine shortages.
Israel has meanwhile kept up its bombardment, with Gaza’s civil defense agency reporting at least 19 people had been killed in Israeli attacks on Thursday.
Umm Talal Al-Masri, 53, a displaced Palestinian in Gaza City, described the situation as “unbearable.”
“No one is distributing anything to us. Everyone is waiting for aid, but we haven’t received anything,” she said.
“We barely manage to prepare one meal a day.”
UN agencies have said that the amount of aid entering Gaza falls far short of what is required to ease the crisis.
“I am tormented for my children,” said Hossam Abu Aida, another resident of the Gaza Strip.
“For them, I fear hunger and disease more than I do Israeli bombardment,” the 38-year-old added. The army stepped up its offensive at the weekend, vowing to defeat Hamas, whose October 2023 attack on Israel triggered the war.
Israel has faced mounting pressure, including from traditional allies, to halt its expanded offensive and allow aid into Gaza.
EU foreign ministers agreed on Tuesday to review the bloc’s cooperation accord with Israel.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry has said the EU action “reflects a total misunderstanding of the complex reality Israel is facing.”
Sweden said it would press the 27-nation bloc to impose sanctions on Israeli ministers, while Britain suspended free-trade negotiations with Israel and summoned the Israeli ambassador.
There has been a global spike in anti-Semitic attacks since the Hamas attack in 2023, with a gunman shooting dead two Israeli Embassy staffers outside a Jewish museum in Washington.
Britain, France, Germany, the US, and other countries around the world all condemned the shooting.
