Iran flood death toll rises to 76, causes up to $2.5 bln damage

Agencies

April 14, 2019

London, Apr 14: Seventy-six people have been killed in Iran by floods in recent weeks, according to a new toll published Sunday with warnings still in place for large swathes of the country.

“With the death of five people in the Khuzestan province flood and another person in Ilam province the death toll has now reached 76,” since March 19, according to a statement published online by the coroner’s office.

Floods caused by heavy rain across Iran in recent weeks have caused an estimated $2.5 billion in damage to roads, bridges, homes and agricultural land, state media cited ministers as telling lawmakers on Sunday.

The flooding, which began on March 19, has killed 76 people, forced more than 220,000 people into emergency shelters, and left aid agencies struggling to cope. The armed forces have been deployed to help those affected.

“The recent floods are unprecedented... 25 provinces and more than 4,400 villages have been affected,” Interior Minister Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli was quoted as saying in parliament by state news agency IRNA.

Fazli said the floods had caused around 350 trillion rials ($2.5 billion) worth of damage.

Minister of Roads and Urban Development Mohammad Eslami said 14,000 kilometers (8,700 miles) of road had been damaged and more than 700 bridges completely destroyed by landslides and flood water.

The government has said it will pay compensation to all those who have incurred losses, especially farmers but the Islamic Republic’s state budget is already stretched as US sanctions on its energy and banking sectors have halved Iranian oil exports and restricted access to some revenues abroad.

Morteza Shahidzadeh, head of Iran’s sovereign wealth fund, said President Hassan Rouhani had asked permission from the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to withdraw $2 billion from the fund for reconstruction in flood-hit areas.

Shahidzadeh said Khamenei has in principle agreed to the request.

Iranian officials have repeatedly said the massive floods have not affected production and development at any oilfields, nor impeded the flow of crude through pipelines to recipient markets.

Karim Zobeidi, an official at the National Iranian Oil Company, was cited as saying on Sunday that it was still too early to estimate the extent of the flood damage to Iran’s energy sector.

Mehr news agency also quoted Zobeidi as saying that some oil wells in western Iran had been closed as a precaution to guard against any flooding.

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Israel launches bloody ground offensive into Gaza’s Jabalia refugee camp

News Network

May 12,2024

Israeli military tanks have started to go deeper into the Jabalia refugee camp in northern Gaza as part of a ground offensive months after claiming Hamas had been “dismantled” in the area.

Israeli forces are “carpet-bombing” the eastern areas of Jabalia refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip, killing and wounding several Palestinians, Al-Jazeara reported citing local sources on Sunday.

Israeli military tanks have advanced further into the Jabalia refugee camp, crossing Salah al-Din Street amidst ongoing battles with Hamas fighters, reports added.

Media quoted eyewitnesses as saying that the tanks are surrounding evacuation centers and residential buildings in the densely populated area, leading to mass evacuations and displacement towards the western part of Gaza City.

Also, Israeli drones targeted ambulances near the clinic run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) in Jabalia, according to Mahmoud Basal, the spokesperson for the civil defense directorate in Gaza.

Basal stated that emergency crews in Rafah, al-Zaytounm, al-Sabra, and Jabalia have been inundated with distress calls, confirming that these areas were subjected to overnight bombardment.

Shortage of oxygen for patients

Imad Abu Zayda, an emergency doctor in Jabalia, warned of the critical conditions prevailing there due to the recent Israeli aggression in the area.

“No light due to the lack of fuel and there’s no medical supplement available as Israel has expanded their operation in the area. We have no oxygen to give to patients,” he said.

He added that the majority of those injured are children and women, and the medical team is grappling with limited resources to provide essential care.

All hospitals in the northern Gaza Strip are now out of service, following a warning from the UN about the risk of running out of fuel in hospitals across the region.

Israel’s closure of the Rafah crossing has also prevented aid trucks from entering the area since May 5.

The Jabalia refugee camp, established in 1948 to accommodate Palestinians who were displaced after the Nakba, or catastrophe, which refers to the ethnic cleansing of Palestine in 1948, has become the most densely populated refugee camp in the Gaza Strip.

With over 750,000 Palestinians forcefully displaced, this camp stands as a testament to the birth of Israel in 1948.

Since the start of the Israeli war on the Gaza Strip on October 7, Israeli forces carried out several attacks on Jabilia camp, leaving it in ruins by intense bombardment.

In early February, Israeli forces withdrew from the camp claiming it had destroyed Hamas as a fighting force in the northern areas.

On Saturday, the Israeli military ordered residents of the Jabalia Refugee Camp to evacuate “immediately”, as it prepares to launch military operations against Hamas.

However, the displaced residents have no place to seek refuge, as the UN reports a severe famine in the region.

Since the start of the offensive, the Tel Aviv regime has killed more than 34,971 Palestinians and injured more than 78,641 others, mostly women and children.

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