Foreign transporters used pilgrim luggage to smuggle drugs into Saudi Arabia!

Dubai: Dubai was slapped by heavy floods as the United Arab Emirates (UAE) was hit by extremely heavy rains on Tuesday. The desert city received over a year and a half's worth of rain in just a day even as heavy thunderstorms lashed other parts of the UAE.

Roads turned into rivers as they were filled up with water. Shopping centres like Dubai Mall and Mall of the Emirates were also seen flooding.

Schools across the UAE have been shut and are expected to remain closed on today as well.

According to a report by India Today, Dubai airport received about 100 mm of rain in just 12 hours on Tuesday and a total of 160 mm in the last 24 hours.

On average, Dubai receives about 88.9 mm of rain in a year, which concludes that the city received more than a year's rain in a day.

Dubai International Airport said on Wednesday it was experiencing significant disruption due to bad weather and was working to restore normal operations as quickly as possible.

Flights have been delayed or diverted and impacted by displaced crew, the airport said in a statement, adding that recovery would take some time.

Dubai's Emirates airline said that it was suspending check-in for passengers departing the airport from 8 am (0400 GMT) on Wednesday until midnight due to operational challenges caused by the bad weather and road conditions.

Dubai International was temporarily diverting arriving flights on Tuesday evening because of a storm, and operations were suspended for 25 minutes earlier in the day.

According to India Today, the airport stopped flight operations and issued a warning earlier today on X.

The Dubai International Airport requested the passengers to check their flight status.

Employees in Dubai have been told to work from home.

The UAE Government took to X and said, "Based on the directives of the Council of Ministers, it was decided to extend remote work until tomorrow, Wednesday, April 17, for all federal government employees, with the exception of jobs that require presence at the workplace, taking into account the weather condition that the country is going through."

Austrian police authorities have arrested the director of a Palestinian news agency based in the Gaza Strip, which is aligned with the Hamas resistance movement, following spurious allegations and intense pressure from the Tel Aviv regime’s officials.

Gaza Now News Network wrote in a post published on the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, that “the occupying Israeli regime is trying hard to prosecute anyone connected to the Palestinian media as part of attempts to silence the voice of wounded Gaza and stop disclosure of the Palestinian nation’s sufferings and the massacres being committed against women, children and the elderly.”

It added, “The latest of such attempts was the prosecution of Palestinian-born journalist Mustafa Ayyash. Austrian police stormed his house, tampered with his personal belongings, confiscated electronic devices, arrested him and his wife, and took him for interrogation.”

Gaza Now noted that the Austrian police hacked its WhatsApp account, which is followed by 300,000 users, and closed it down. They also shut the news network’s Facebook pages and accounts, which are followed by some eight million users.

It underscored that Israeli officials threaten Ayyash from time to time with prosecution and assassination, and hamper the activities of the news network on social media platforms.

This comes as the Israeli military had earlier targeted Ayyash's family and killed scores of his relatives in a series of airstrikes in late November ahead of a temporary ceasefire.

The Permanent Observer of Palestine at the United Nations Salah Abdel-Shafi and Chairman of Hamas Political Bureau Ismail Haniyeh mourned the death of his family.

Back on March 27, US and UK authorities unveiled sanctions against two people and three companies related to Gaza Now over alleged fundraising efforts “in support of Hamas.”

The Treasury Department said in a statement that Gaza Now, whose popular Telegram channel has more than 1.8 million followers, and its founder started fundraising for Hamas after the movement’s Operation al-Aqsa Storm against Israel on October 7.

The US also slapped sanctions against Aozma Sultana, the director of two companies that allegedly gave “thousands of dollars to Gaza Now and advertised Gaza Now as a partner during a joint fundraiser shortly after the large-scale surprise attack.”

Separately, the UK Treasury announced a full asset freeze against two individuals suspected of providing financial support for Gaza Now.

“All funds and economic resources in the UK belonging to or controlled by Sultana and Ayyash have been frozen,” they added.

Qatar and Kuwait have banned any use of their airspace and air bases for attacks against Iran amid heightened tensions between Iran and the Israeli regime following an Israeli attack early this month on an Iranian diplomatic mission in Syria.

Reports on Saturday indicated that both Qatar and Kuwait had issued directives to the United States stressing that the US military will not be allowed to use air bases in the two countries for carrying out any potential airstrikes on Iran.

Qatar and Kuwait have also indicated that their airspace will not be available for any military action against Iran.

The US has military aircraft at the Ali Al Salem Air Base and Ahmed Al Jaber Air Base in Kuwait. The Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar is also the largest US air base in the West Asia region.

The directives issued by Iran’s two Arab neighbors come amid reports showing that Iran is preparing to respond to an Israeli airstrike that killed two of its senior military commanders in its consulate in the Syrian capital Damascus on April 1.

Washington has urged Iran to deescalate while saying that it will defend Israel in case it is attacked.

Iran, which has no direct relations with the US, has called on regional Arab countries to advise the US not to interfere if Israel is attacked.

Countries have been wary of a major confrontation in the region more than six months into an Israeli onslaught on the Gaza Strip.

Reports show they have already limited the ability of the US to use their airspace and air bases for attacks on resistance groups that are allied with Iran and have been attacking Israeli and US interests in the region since the start of the Israeli aggression on Gaza.