Beirut blast: ‘It was like the apocalypse’

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Emergency fire crews and shocked onlookers search for people trapped under rubble after two massive explosions rocked the Lebanese capital, sending plumes of smoke billowing into the air and damaging buildings miles away. (AFP)
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Updated 05 August 2020
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Beirut blast: ‘It was like the apocalypse’

  • Two huge explosions that left more than 70 people dead and thousands injured have added to Lebanon’s grief

BEIRUT: Lebanon’s prime minister made a desperate plea for international help after twin explosions devastated Beirut and plunged his country deeper into crisis. 

The two massive blasts killed at least 73 people, injured more than 3,700, and destroyed and damaged buildings across the capital.

While the cause of the blasts remains unclear, Lebanese leader Hassan Diab vowed that those responsible would be punished.

“What happened today will not pass without accountability,” he said in a televised address. “Those responsible for this catastrophe will pay the price.”

With the country already trapped in a crippling economic crisis and battling COVID-19, Diab appealed for international assistance.

“I am sending an urgent appeal to all countries that are friends and brothers and love Lebanon, to stand by its side and help us treat these deep wounds,” he said.

The explosions took place at a warehouse in the city’s port shortly after 6 p.m.

Lebanon’s internal security chief Abbas Ibrahim said the blasts occurred in a section of the port housing highly explosive materials that had been confiscated and stored there for years.

Diab said that the “dangerous warehouse” had been there since 2014.

Even in a city with a history of conflict, the scale of the explosions was unprecedented. The blasts were so strong the they were felt in Cyprus, 200 km away.

Videos showed an initial explosion and fire, followed by a massive blast and shockwave spreading through the city’s buildings. People could be heard screaming and running for cover in restaurants and from balconies. Many thought they had been hit by an earthquake.


INTERNATIONAL REACTIONS

  • "The Kingdom expresses its sincere condolences to the families of the victims and the injured." - Saudi Arabian Ministry of Foreign Affair
  • "We stand ready to assist the people of Lebanon as they recover from this horrible tragedy." - Mike Pompeo, US Secretary of State
  • "I express my fraternal solidarity with the Lebanese. France stands with Lebanon. Always." - French President Emmanuel Macron (tweeted in Arabic).
  • "The United States stands ready to assist Lebanon. We will be there to help." - US President Donald Trump 
  • "Our prayers are with our Lebanese brothers and sisters." - Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed, Abu Dhabi Crown Prince
  • "My sincere condolences and sympathies to our brothers in Lebanon." - Egypt President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi
  • "We share the pain of the Lebanese people and reach out to offer our aid." - Israeli President Reuven Rivlin

“It was like a nuclear explosion,” Walid Abdo, a 43-year-old school teacher in the neighborhood of Gemayzeh, told AP.

Bloodied residents poured into the city’s streets as emergency teams rushed to the scene. Ambulances from across the country headed to the capital to help treat the injured.

Buildings across the entire city were damaged, with windows blown out and ceilings collapsed.

By nightfall the injured were flooding the city’s hospitals, with many being seen by medics on the pavements outside.

Health Minister Hassan Hamad said the hospitals were barely coping, and offers of aid were pouring in from Arab states and friends of Lebanon. Lebanese Red Cross official Georges Kettaneh said the injured were being taken to hospitals outside the capital because facilities there were full.

As speculation mounted over what had caused the explosions, an Israeli official said his country, which has fought several wars with Lebanon, had nothing to do with the blasts.

The explosions took place just days before a UN tribunal was due to deliver verdicts against four men accused of killing the former prime minister Rafik Hariri and 21 others in a 2005 bombing that shook the region. The suspects are members of Hezbollah, the Iran-backed militant group that has since increased its role in the country’s government as well as conflicts across the region.

Rafik’s son Saad, also a former prime minister, said the  explosions had left Beirut “crying.”

“Everyone is being called to rescue (the country) and (provide) solidarity with our people,” he said. “The magnitude of the losses is too great to be described”

Prime Minister Diab declared a day of mourning on Wednesday, while President Michel Aoun called for an emergency meeting of the Supreme Defence Council, which declared Beirut a disaster-stricken city.

Across Lebanon and among the country’s widespread diaspora, Lebanese were left in shock at the latest tragedy to befall their homeland. Many scrambled to contact relatives and friends.

Lebanese musician Jad Choueiri said the scenes near his home in the Achrafieh neighborhood “looked like the apocalypse.”

He posted an image of his apartment windows blasted across his living room. “I could have died,” he said. “Blood is everywhere on the streets.”

Lebanese journalist Rima Maktabi tearfully described the damage to her home. “My house is gone I think,” she told Al Arabiya, the channel where she works.

Raja Farah, a pastry chef, said he was just half a kilometer from the blasts.

“It is impossible to explain the magnitude of this explosion. I was about as far from the Hariri blast a few years ago, and this was 100 times more powerful,” he said.

Across the city shocked workers and businesses owners poured into the streets.

A video from inside the offices of the Daily Star newspaper showed scenes of devastation, with computers strewn across the floor and ceilings collapsed.

The foyers of the city’s most famous hotels — the Four Seasons and the InterContinental Phoenicia Beirut — were strewn with broken glass.

At the scene of the blast, fire crews battled the blaze into the evening. Helicopters dumped water on flattened buildings as a ship in the port remained on fire.

Beirut’s tearful governor Marwan Abboud toured the site, saying: “Beirut is a devastated city.”

As the scale of the tragedy unfolded, foreign governments, both in the Arab world and beyond, offered their support.

Saudi Arabia said it was following the tragedy with great concern and affirmed the Kingdom’s support and solidarity with the Lebanese people. The UAE’s Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed said: “We pray that God grants you patience and solace. God bless Lebanon and the Lebanese people.”

Similar offers of support were sent from Bahrain, Kuwait, Egypt and Jordan. Israel, which is technically still at war with Lebanon, offered medical and humanitarian aid.

The US State Department said it stands ready to offer all possible assistance,” while France’s President Emmanuel Macron called Aoun to tell him French aid had been sent to Lebanon.


Sudan army inches closer to retaking Khartoum

Updated 11 sec ago
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Sudan army inches closer to retaking Khartoum

  • Shelling by Rapid Support Forces kills six civilians, including two children

OMDURMAN: Shelling by Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces killed six civilians, including two children, in Khartoum’s twin city of Omdurman, a doctor said Monday, as the army inched closer to the capital’s presidential palace.

Sunday’s attack also wounded 36 civilians, half of them children, the doctor at Al-Nao Hospital said.

The bombardment struck residential areas in northern Omdurman, hitting civilians inside their homes and children playing on a football field, the Khartoum regional government’s media office said.

The war between the RSF and the army, which began in April of 2023, has escalated recently, with army forces seeking to reclaim territory lost to the RSF early in the conflict in the capital, Khartoum, and beyond.

The army says its units are now less than a kilometer from the presidential palace, which the RSF seized at the war’s outset. In a video address shared on Telegram on Saturday, RSF commander Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo vowed his troops “will not leave the Republican Palace.”

AFP journalists saw thick plumes of smoke rising over central Khartoum as fighting raged across the capital, with gunfire and explosions heard in several areas.

Nationwide, the conflict has killed tens of thousands, uprooted more than 12 million, and created the world’s largest hunger and displacement crises.

In Khartoum alone, at least 3.5 million people have been forced from their homes due to the violence, according to the UN.

Further southwest, in the North Kordofan state capital of El-Obeid — roughly 400 km from Khartoum — two civilians were killed and 15 others wounded after RSF forces shelled residential neighborhoods on Monday morning, a medical source at the city’s main hospital said.

Last month, the military broke through a nearly two-year RSF siege of the southern city, a key crossroads linking Khartoum to the vast Darfur region, which is under near-total RSF control.

Across North Kordofan, more than 200,000 people are currently displaced, while nearly a million are facing acute food insecurity, according to UN figures.

Clashes have also erupted in Blue Nile state, which borders South Sudan and Ethiopia, and where the RSF claimed Sunday to have destroyed military vehicles and taken prisoners from the army and allied forces.

In almost two years, the war has nearly torn Sudan into two, with the RSF in control of almost all of Darfur in the west and parts of the south, while the army holds the country’s north and east.

The army has made gains in central Sudan and Khartoum in recent months and appears to be on the verge of reclaiming the entire capital.


Algeria rejects French deportation drive in latest row

Updated 40 min 35 sec ago
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Algeria rejects French deportation drive in latest row

  • Algerian authorities would not accept a list handed over by France in recent days with the names of around 60 Algerians set for deportation
  • French Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau has said those selected were 'dangerous' or former convicts

ALGIERS: Algeria on Monday opposed a French bid to deport several dozen Algerians, rejecting “threats” and “ultimatums” by Paris as the two countries’ ties came under increasing strain.
The Algerian foreign ministry said in a statement that the authorities would not accept a list handed over by France in recent days with the names of around 60 Algerians set for deportation.
It cited procedural requirements but also said Algeria “categorically rejects threats and intimidation attempts, as well as.... ultimatums.”
In rejecting the French list, Algeria was “solely motivated by the wish to fulfil its duty of consular protection for its citizens” and to ensure “the rights of individuals subject to deportation measures,” the ministry’s statement said.
Hard-line French Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau has said those selected for deportation were “dangerous” or former convicts.
Relations between Paris and Algiers have been strained since French President Emmanuel Macron recognized Moroccan sovereignty of the disputed territory of Western Sahara in July last year.
But they have worsened since Algiers refused to accept the return of undocumented Algerian migrants from France.
Retailleau has led verbal attacks on Algeria in the media, fueling tensions between the countries.
In late February, Prime Minister Francois Bayrou warned Paris could revoke a special status given to Algerians in France, the former colonial power.
Macron has since voiced his support for “renegotiating,” though not annulling, the 1968 agreement Bayrou was referring to.
Algeria was a French colony from the mid-19th century until 1962 and for most of that period was considered an integral part of metropolitan France.
On February 28, the French president said that agreements mandating the automatic return of nationals, signed between the two countries in 1994, “must be fully respected.”
In recent months, France has arrested and deported a number of undocumented Algerians on suspicion of inciting violence, only for Algeria to send back one of those expelled.
France warned it could restrict visas as a result, as well as limit development aid.
Algeria’s government has previously criticized Macron for “blatant and unacceptable interference in an internal Algerian affair.”


Israel strikes southern Syria: state media, monitor

Israel struck area of Syria’s southern city of Daraa, the state news agency SANA reported Monday. (File/AFP)
Updated 17 March 2025
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Israel strikes southern Syria: state media, monitor

  • “Israeli occupation jets launch air strikes targeting the surroundings of Daraa city,” said Damascus’s official news agency SANA
  • Monitor said Israel targeted military site once belonging to Assad’s army but now used by the forces of Syria’s new authorities

DAMASCUS: Israel struck the area of Syria’s southern city of Daraa, the state news agency SANA reported, with a war monitor saying the latest Israeli attack targeted a military site.
“Israeli occupation jets launch air strikes targeting the surroundings of Daraa city,” said Damascus’s official news agency SANA, without immediately providing further details.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitor said Israel targeted a military site once belonging to ousted president Bashar Assad’s army but now used by the forces of Syria’s new authorities.
The Britain-based Observatory reported that a fire broke out, with ambulances rushing to the scene amid reports of casualties.
Since Assad’s overthrow in December, Israel has carried out hundreds of air strikes in Syria and deployed troops to a UN-patrolled buffer zone on the strategic Golan Heights.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said the air force conducted a strike on Damascus on Thursday, with the military saying it had hit a “command center” of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad group.
The Observatory reported one fatality in that strike, with SANA saying it targeted a building in the capital.
The Israeli military said the “command center was used to plan and direct terrorist activities by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad” against Israel.
A source in Islamic Jihad said a building belonging to the group had been hit by Israeli jets, adding there were “martyrs and wounded” in the strike.
Ismail Sindawi, Islamic Jihad’s representative in Syria, told AFP the targeted building had been “closed for five years and nobody from the movement frequented it.” Israel was just sending a message, Sindawi said.
Even before Assad’s fall, during the Syrian civil war that broke out in 2011, Israel carried out hundreds of strikes in the country, mainly on government forces and Iranian-linked targets.


Jordan’s FM says Syria’s reconstruction must preserve security, unity

Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi and his Syrian counterpart, Asaad Al-Shaibani, in Brussels, March 17, 2025. (Petra)
Updated 17 March 2025
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Jordan’s FM says Syria’s reconstruction must preserve security, unity

  • Ayman Safadi met his Syrian counterpart on the sidelines of an international conference in Brussels
  • Ties between Amman and Damascus have improved since the fall of the Assad regime 

LONDON: Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi met his Syrian counterpart, Asaad Al-Shaibani, in Brussels on Monday on the sidelines of an international conference to support Syria’s political transformation.

Ties between the neighboring countries have improved since the fall of the Bashar Assad regime in December. Interim president of the Syrian Arab Republic, Ahmad Al-Sharaa, visited Amman in late February.

In Brussels, the ministers discussed the most recent developments in Syria. Safadi said that Jordan supports Syria’s reconstruction on the basis of preserving its security and unity while protecting the rights of Syrians, the Petra agency reported.

On Monday, the EU hosted the ninth international conference to support Syria. Representatives from the new interim government were invited to attend for the first time, including Al-Shaibani.

The event aims to bolster international support for Syria’s transition and recovery following more than 13 years of civil war.


Palestinian detainees ministry warns of virus outbreak in Israeli Megiddo Prison

Updated 17 March 2025
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Palestinian detainees ministry warns of virus outbreak in Israeli Megiddo Prison

  • 90 percent of prisoners have suffered from diarrhea and vomiting in the past 10 days
  • Ministry accuses Israel Prison Service of medical negligence for not providing adequate treatment

LONDON: The Palestinian Authority warned on Monday of a virus outbreak among Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails that could severely affect their health and well-being.

The PA’s Ministry of Detainees and Ex-Detainees Affairs reported that prisoners in Megiddo Prison in northern Israel have been suffering from diarrhea and vomiting in the past 10 days. It reported that nearly 90 percent of the prisoners experienced these issues, and some lost consciousness due to the severity of the illness, particularly among the elderly.

The ministry accused the Israel Prison Service of medical negligence for not providing adequate treatment. Megiddo Prison is the second-largest Israeli prison, following the notorious Negev Desert Prison.

Since October 2023, the ministry has recorded the deaths of 53 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, with the most recent being Moataz Abu Zneid from Dura, south of Hebron, in the occupied West Bank.

By the end of December, Israel had detained 9,619 Palestinians, including 2,216 from the Gaza Strip. However, Tel Aviv released around 600 Palestinians in a ceasefire and captive exchange deal with Hamas in early 2025.