Russia, Turkey and Spain express deep concern about Israeli raids in Lebanon

FRANKFURT: Israel must “immediately” improve humanitarian conditions in Gaza, the German government’s representative for human rights and humanitarian aid said Monday, ahead of a trip to Israel and the Palestinian territories.

Until recently Israel has enjoyed broad support across the political spectrum in Germany, but Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s tone toward Israel has sharpened as the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza has deteriorated.

Last month, the United Nations officially declared a famine in Gaza, after a UN-backed report warned that 500,000 people were facing “catastrophic” conditions in the war-ravaged territory.

“The Israeli government must improve the humanitarian situation in Gaza immediately, comprehensively, sustainably, and in accordance with humanitarian principles and international law,” said envoy Lars Castellucci, a lawmaker of the Social Democrats, which govern with Merz’s conservatives.

He condemned the “immeasurable” suffering of civilians, especially children, who are trapped in the conflict and “bear neither guilt nor responsibility.”

German humanitarian aid to Gaza “has been increased several times,” but it is “pointless” as long as it does not reach those in need, he said.

While he reaffirmed Germany’s “special responsibility” for Israel’s security and called for the “immediate release” of hostages held by Hamas, he also stressed the urgency of a ceasefire and advocated a “two state solution.”

The war in Gaza erupted following Hamas’s October 2023 attack on Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.

Of the 251 hostages seized during the attack, 47 are still being held in Gaza, around 20 of whom are believed to be alive.

Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 63,459 Palestinians, most of them civilians, according to figures from the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza that the United Nations considers reliable.

TANGIER: Sun-baked Morocco, grappling with its worst drought in decades, has launched a pilot project aimed at slowing water evaporation while simultaneously generating green energy using floating solar panels.

At a major reservoir near the northern city of Tangier, thousands of so-called “floatovoltaic” panels protect the water’s surface from the blazing sun and absorb its light to generate electricity.

Authorities plan to power the neighboring Tanger Med port complex with the resulting energy, and if it proves a success, the technology could have far wider implications for the North African country.

According to official figures, Morocco’s water reserves lost the equivalent of more than 600 Olympic-sized swimming pools every day to evaporation between October 2022 and September 2023.

Over that same period, temperatures averaged 1.8C higher than normal, meaning water evaporated at a higher rate.

Alongside other factors like declining rainfall, this has reduced reservoirs nationwide to about one-third of their capacity.

Water Ministry official Yassine Wahbi said the Tangier reservoir loses around 3,000 cubic meters a day to evaporation, but that figure more than doubles in the hot summer months.

The floating photovoltaic panels can help cut evaporation by about 30 percent, he said.

The ministry has said the floating panels represent “an important gain in a context of increasingly scarce water resources,” even if the evaporation they stop is, for now, relatively marginal.

Assessment studies are underway for another two similar projects in Oued El-Makhazine, at one of Morocco’s largest dams in the north, and in Lalla Takerkoust near Marrakech.

Similar technology is being tested in France, Indonesia and Thailand, while China already operates some of the world’s largest floating solar farms.

Since the Moroccan pilot program began late last year, more than 400 floating platforms supporting several thousand panels have been installed.

The government wants more, planning to reach 22,000 panels that would cover about 10 hectares at the 123-hectare Tangier reservoir.

Once completed, the system would generate roughly 13 megawatts of electricity — enough to power the Tanger Med complex.

Authorities also have plans to plant trees along the banks of the reservoir to reduce winds, believed to exacerbate evaporation.

Climate science Prof. Mohammed-Said Karrouk called it a “pioneering” project.

He noted, however, that the reservoir is too large and its surface too irregular to cover completely with floating panels, which could be damaged with fluctuating water levels.

Official data shows water reserves fed by rainfall have fallen by nearly 75 percent in the past decade compared with the 1980s, dropping from an annual average of 18 billion cubic meters to only five.

Morocco has so far mainly relied on desalination to combat shortages, producing about 320 million cubic meters of potable water a year.

Authorities aim to expand production to 1.7 billion cubic meters yearly by 2030.

Karrouk said an urgent priority should be transferring surplus water from northern dams to regions in central and southern Morocco that are more impacted by the years-long drought.

The country already has a system dubbed the “water highway” — a 67-kilometer canal linking the Sebou basin to the capital Rabat — with plans to expand the network to other dams.