Tunisia arrests opposition party official in continuing crackdown on critics
Tunisia arrests opposition party official in continuing crackdown on critics/node/2549351/middle-east
Tunisia arrests opposition party official in continuing crackdown on critics
A view of the headquarters of the Tunisian Islamist party Ennahda in the capital Tunis before it was ordered closed last year by the government of President Kais Saied. (AFP/File)
Tunisia arrests opposition party official in continuing crackdown on critics
Ajami Lourimi, secretary-general of the Ennahdha Party, was detained with two others without judicial permission, party says
Ennahdha was the largest party in parliament until President Kais Saied dissolved the legislature in July 2021
Updated 14 July 2024
TUNIS: A leader of Tunisia’s Islamist-inspired opposition party Ennahdha was arrested Saturday, his party said in a statement on Facebook.
The party, whose chief Rached Ghannouchi has been in jail since April last year, did not give any reason for the arrest.
“Ajami Lourimi, the secretary-general of the Ennahdha Party, was detained without judicial permission along with two companions in Borj Al Amrim,” around 37 kilometers (23 miles) west of the capital Tunis, the statement said.
Ennahdha was the largest party in parliament until President Kais Saied dissolved the legislature in July 2021.
He has since ruled by decree in the only democracy to emerge from the Arab Spring uprisings that swept the region more than a decade ago.
Last September, two leaders of Ennahdha, former prime minister Hamadi Jebali and Mondher Ounissi, who had served as Ennahdha’s acting chairman since Ghannouchi’s arrest, were arrested.
Saied’s government closed Ennahdha’s offices across Tunisia after Ghannouchi’s arrest over charges related to “terrorism.”
He is the best-known opposition figure imprisoned in Tunisia since Saied dismissed parliament and seized all state power in 2021.
Ennahdha had dominated Tunisian politics since the 2011 revolt that toppled the dictatorship of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and launched the region’s Arab Spring revolts.
Ghannouchi was among more than 20 of Saied’s political opponents and other prominent figures, including former ministers and business executives, arrested early last year.
The arrests came as the North African country readies for its general presidential elections, set to take place in October.
Saied has not yet announced if he will seek another term.
US orders submarine, aircraft carrier to rush to Mideast as Israel warns of coming Iran attack
Israel defense chief Gallant says large-scale attack expected from Iran, Axios reports
Officials have been on lookout for retaliatory strikes by Iran, Hezbollah for recent assassinations
Updated 12 August 2024
AP Reuters
WASHINGTON: US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has ordered a guided missile submarine to the Middle East and is telling the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier strike group to sail more quickly to the area, the Defense Department said Sunday.
Austin issued the order after speaking with Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who told him Iran's military preparations suggest Iran is getting ready for a large-scale attack on Israel, Axios reporter Barak Ravid said on X, citing a source with knowledge of the call.
The moves come as the US and other allies push for Israel and Hamas to achieve a cease-fire agreement that could help calm soaring tensions in the region following the assassination of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran and a senior Hezbollah commander in Beirut.
While the USS Georgia, a nuclear-powered submarine, was already in the Mediterranean Sea in July, according to a US military post on social media, it was a rare move to publicly announce the deployment of a submarine.
In a statement after Austin spoke with his Israeli counterpart, the Pentagon said the defense chief had ordered the Abraham Lincoln strike group to accelerate its deployment to the region.
“Secretary Austin reiterated the United States’ commitment to take every possible step to defend Israel and noted the strengthening of US military force posture and capabilities throughout the Middle East in light of escalating regional tensions,” Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder, Pentagon press secretary, said in a statement.
Ryder said Austin had reiterated to Gallant America's commitment “to take every possible step to defend Israel and noted the strengthening of US military force posture and capabilities throughout the Middle East in light of escalating regional tensions.”
The US military had already said it will deploy additional fighter jets and Navy warships to the Middle East as Washington seeks to bolster Israeli defenses.
Officials have been on the lookout for retaliatory strikes by both Iran and Hezbollah for the killings, and the US has been beefing up its presence in the region.
The Lincoln, which has been in the Asia Pacific, had already been ordered to the region to replace the USS Theodore Roosevelt aircraft carrier strike group, which is scheduled to begin heading home from the Middle East. Last week, Austin said the Lincoln would arrive in the Central Command area by the end of the month.
It wasn't clear Sunday what his latest order means, or how much more quickly the Lincoln will steam to the Middle East. The carrier has F-35 fighter jets aboard, along with the F/A-18 fighter aircraft that are also on carriers.
Ryder said Austin and Gallant also discussed Israel's military operations in Gaza and the importance of mitigating civilian harm.
The call comes a day after an Israeli airstrike hit a school-turned-shelter in Gaza early Saturday, killing at least 80 people and wounding nearly 50 others, Palestinian health authorities said, in one of the deadliest attacks of the 10-month Israel-Hamas war.
The US military had already said it will deploy additional fighter jets and Navy warships to the Middle East as Washington seeks to bolster Israeli defenses.
Ismail Haniyeh, the political leader of Iran-backed Hamas, was assassinated in the Iranian capital Tehran on July 31, an attack that drew threats of revenge by Iran against Israel, which is fighting the Palestinian Islamist group in Gaza. Iran blamed Israel for the killing. Israel has not claimed responsibility.
The assassination and the killing of the senior military commander of the Iran-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah, Fuad Shukr, by Israel in a strike on Beirut, have fueled concern the conflict in Gaza was turning into a wider Middle East war.
Iran has said the US bears responsibility in the assassination of Haniyeh because of its support for Israel.
Several US and coalition personnel were wounded in a drone attack on Friday in Syria, in the second major attack in recent days against US forces amid soaring tensions in the Middle East.
In Iraq’s summer, residents of Kurdistan’s Irbil ache for water
Iraq is known in Arabic as the Land of the Two Rivers, referring to the once mighty Tigris and Euphrates
Updated 12 August 2024
AFP
IRBIL, Iraq: The taps have run dry, and the wells are almost empty. In the capital of Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region, 80-year-old Babir hasn’t bathed in weeks and impatiently waits for trucked-in water deliveries.
“There is nothing worse than not having water,” said Babir, who gave only his first name, in his modest house in Irbil’s Darto suburb.
As in several other densely populated areas of Irbil and its suburbs, Babir and his neighbors rely on groundwater as their primary water source.
But for years, they have dreaded summer, when relentless drought, a lack of wells and power outages that bring pumps to a halt leave them cut off the supply of water.
For everything from bathing to watering plants, cooking and washing, they have been forced to depend on trucked-in water.
Usually “we bathe once every fortnight,” said Babir, dressed in traditional Kurdish sarwal trousers.
From the roof of his house, he shouted for a water truck as it drove up into the street, then hurried downstairs to request a refill for his home.
This time, the truck belonged to a local aid group. When such assistance is unavailable, the retiree has to pay from his meagre pension or rely on family for water and other essentials.
Over the years, residents of several districts have taken to the streets many times to demand solutions, but Babir said appeals to officials had fallen on deaf ears. He said he was considering moving “to a place with water.”
Iraq is known in Arabic as the Land of the Two Rivers, referring to the once mighty Tigris and Euphrates. But the rivers’ water levels have plummeted and the UN classifies the country as one of the most impacted by some effects of climate change.
Authorities blame the drought as well as dams built upstream in neighboring Turkiye and Iran.
Irbil relies on 1,240 wells dotted across the city alongside the Ifraz water station that draws from the upper Zab River, which has its source in Turkiye and joins the Tigris in Iraq.
Its governor, Omed Khoshnaw, told reporters earlier this month that “more than 25 percent of wells have dried up this year,” adding that Irbil should rely less on groundwater.
Amid the crisis, the city’s local authorities say they have allocated 1.5 billion Iraqi dinars ($1.1 million) to help solve it, including by digging new wells and providing power via generators and the electricity grid.
Local official Nabz Abdul Hamid said that power outages have heavily impacted pumps for wells in residential areas.
“We have now provided an uninterrupted electricity supply to most of the wells,” he told AFP, adding that officials were working to fix the broader problem including by improving the Ifraz plant supply.
In the Darto district, one person skillfully maneuvered the aid truck’s hose as a torrent of water gushed into a tank.
A young girl waited to fill plastic bottles while other children joyfully splashed water on their faces, finding relief from the relentless heat.
But when it comes to washing, Surur Mohamad, 49, said that for anything more than basic clothes he goes to a nearby village where they have a steady water supply.
Trucked-in water from aid organizations “is not a solution,” he said, adding that overcrowding has put further pressure on the water system while poor pipe infrastructure has exacerbated the problem.
“The government must find radical solutions as relying solely on wells” is no longer viable, especially considering the drought, he said.
His neighbor, Mahya Najm, said the lack of water had stopped her children and young families from visiting her.
“We cannot wash, cook or even receive guests,” she said.
“We are in dire need of water. This is not a life,” she added.
US orders submarine, aircraft carrier to rush to Mideast as Israel warns of coming Iran attack
Israel defense chief Gallant says large-scale attack expected from Iran, Axios reports
USS Georgia, a nuclear-powered submarine, was already in the Mediterranean Sea in July, according to a US military post on social media
Updated 12 August 2024
AP Reuters
WASHINGTON: US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has ordered a guided missile submarine to the Middle East and is telling the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier strike group to sail more quickly to the area, the Defense Department said Sunday.
Austin issued the order after speaking with Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, who told him Iran's military preparations suggest Iran is getting ready for a large-scale attack on Israel, Axios reporter Barak Ravid said on X, citing a source with knowledge of the call.
The moves come as the US and other allies push for Israel and Hamas to achieve a cease-fire agreement that could help calm soaring tensions in the region following the assassination of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran and a senior Hezbollah commander in Beirut.
While the USS Georgia, a nuclear-powered submarine, was already in the Mediterranean Sea in July, according to a US military post on social media, it was a rare move to publicly announce the deployment of a submarine.
In a statement after Austin spoke with his Israeli counterpart, the Pentagon said the defense chief had ordered the Abraham Lincoln strike group to accelerate its deployment to the region.
“Secretary Austin reiterated the United States’ commitment to take every possible step to defend Israel and noted the strengthening of US military force posture and capabilities throughout the Middle East in light of escalating regional tensions,” Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder, Pentagon press secretary, said in a statement.
Ryder said Austin had reiterated to Gallant America's commitment “to take every possible step to defend Israel and noted the strengthening of US military force posture and capabilities throughout the Middle East in light of escalating regional tensions.”
The US military had already said it will deploy additional fighter jets and Navy warships to the Middle East as Washington seeks to bolster Israeli defenses.
Officials have been on the lookout for retaliatory strikes by both Iran and Hezbollah for the killings, and the US has been beefing up its presence in the region.
The Lincoln, which has been in the Asia Pacific, had already been ordered to the region to replace the USS Theodore Roosevelt aircraft carrier strike group, which is scheduled to begin heading home from the Middle East. Last week, Austin said the Lincoln would arrive in the Central Command area by the end of the month.
It wasn't clear Sunday what his latest order means, or how much more quickly the Lincoln will steam to the Middle East. The carrier has F-35 fighter jets aboard, along with the F/A-18 fighter aircraft that are also on carriers.
Ryder said Austin and Gallant also discussed Israel's military operations in Gaza and the importance of mitigating civilian harm.
The call comes a day after an Israeli airstrike hit a school-turned-shelter in Gaza early Saturday, killing at least 80 people and wounding nearly 50 others, Palestinian health authorities said, in one of the deadliest attacks of the 10-month Israel-Hamas war.
The US military had already said it will deploy additional fighter jets and Navy warships to the Middle East as Washington seeks to bolster Israeli defenses.
Ismail Haniyeh, the political leader of Iran-backed Hamas, was assassinated in the Iranian capital Tehran on July 31, an attack that drew threats of revenge by Iran against Israel, which is fighting the Palestinian Islamist group in Gaza. Iran blamed Israel for the killing. Israel has not claimed responsibility.
The assassination and the killing of the senior military commander of the Iran-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah, Fuad Shukr, by Israel in a strike on Beirut, have fueled concern the conflict in Gaza was turning into a wider Middle East war.
Iran has said the US bears responsibility in the assassination of Haniyeh because of its support for Israel.
Several US and coalition personnel were wounded in a drone attack on Friday in Syria, in the second major attack in recent days against US forces amid soaring tensions in the Middle East.
Palestinian gunmen kill Israeli in West Bank attack, Israeli military says
Hamas’ Al-Qassam Brigades said its West Bank-based fighters killed an Israeli soldier at point-blank range near the settlement of Mehola in the Jordan Valley and “returned to their bases safely”
Updated 12 August 2024
Reuters
JERUSALEM: An Israeli was killed and another wounded on Sunday by Palestinian gunmen who opened fire on a main road in the occupied West Bank, Israel’s ambulance service and military said, with the armed wing of militant faction Hamas claiming responsibility.
The Israeli military said it was pursuing the suspected assailants, blocking routes and conducting searches.
Later in the day, Hamas’ Al-Qassam Brigades said its West Bank-based fighters killed an Israeli soldier at point-blank range near the settlement of Mehola in the Jordan Valley and “returned to their bases safely.”
It said the operation came in retaliation for Israel’s strike on a school where displaced Palestinians were sheltering in Gaza City on Saturday, which the civil defense service said had killed at least 90 people.
The Israeli military said it had struck a Hamas and Islamic Jihad militant command post in this attack and killed 19 militants. The Hamas and Islamic groups rejected the Israeli military statement.
Violence in the West Bank, already on the rise before the war in Gaza, has escalated further, with stepped-up Israeli military raids, settler violence and Palestinian street attacks.
How a ceasefire in Gaza could help prevent a deadly new outbreak of polio
Overcrowding, destruction of sanitation, and a deteriorating health system have contributed to the reemergence of polio
The WHO has announced plans to send 1.2 million polio vaccines to Gaza after the virus was detected in wastewater
Updated 12 August 2024
ANAN TELLO
LONDON: More than 1 million children in the Gaza Strip are at risk of contracting type 2 poliovirus, a highly infectious disease that can lead to paralysis and even death, as displacement and the destruction of sanitation infrastructure leaves the population vulnerable to disease.
The World Health Organization has announced plans to send 1.2 million polio vaccines to Gaza after the virus was detected in wastewater samples taken last month from displacement camps in the northern governorates of Khan Younis and Deir Al-Balah.
Although no clinical cases of polio have been diagnosed so far, Hanan Balkhy, the WHO’s regional director, warned that the virus could “spread further, including across borders” unless agencies acted quickly to vaccinate the population.
In this photo taken on September 9, 2020, a UNRWA employee provides poliomyeletis vaccine for children at a clinic in Bureij refugee camp in the Gaza Strip. Health officials have detected poliovirus in Gaza again amid a raging war that has destroyed most of the health centers in the area. (AFP/File)
However, any mass polio immunization campaign in Gaza, targeting 600,000 children under the age of 8, would face a host of challenges, chief among them the absence of a ceasefire which would allow medics to safely access displaced communities.
“We need a ceasefire, even a temporary ceasefire, to successfully undertake these campaigns,” Balkhy said at a press briefing on Wednesday.
Children under the age of 5, and especially infants, are most at risk from polio, as many missed out on the regular vaccination campaigns that had taken place in Gaza before the conflict began on Oct. 7.
The virus, which spreads through contact with the feces, saliva or nasal mucus of an infected individual, attacks nerves in the spinal cord and the brain stem, leading to partial or total paralysis within hours.
It can also immobilize chest muscles, causing trouble breathing, even leading to death.
PAHO/WHO infographic
Polio was eradicated in Europe in 2003 thanks to an effective vaccination campaign. There have been no confirmed cases of paralysis due to polio caught in the UK since 1984.
Wild poliovirus cases have fallen by more than 99 percent since 1988, from an estimated 350,000 cases in more than 125 endemic countries to six reported cases in 2021.
Of the three strains of wild poliovirus, type 2 was eradicated in 1999 and type 3 was eradicated in 2020. As of 2022, endemic type 1 remained in just two countries — Pakistan and Afghanistan.
In Gaza, overcrowding, a lack of clean water and hygiene materials, a deteriorating health system, and the destruction of sanitation plants have all contributed to the reemergence of type 2, according to Hamid Jafari, the WHO’s director of polio eradication, speaking at Wednesday’s press briefing.
WHO says overcrowding, a lack of clean water and hygiene materials, a deteriorating health system, and the destruction of sanitation plants have all contributed to the reemergence of polio in Gaza. (AFP)
The UN estimates at least 70 percent of Gaza’s water and sanitation plants, including wastewater treatment facilities and sewage pumping stations, have been damaged or destroyed since the start of the conflict.
In late July, Gaza’s health authority declared the enclave a “polio epidemic zone,” blaming the resurgence of the virus on Israel’s bombing campaign and the ensuing damage this had caused to the healthcare system.
The Israeli military began its bombardment of the Gaza Strip in retaliation for the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack on southern Israel. Although the Israeli military insists it does not target civilian infrastructure, schools, hospitals, and utilities have suffered major damage.
The more than 490 attacks on medical facilities and personnel, documented by the UN during the first six months of the conflict alone, have left Gaza’s healthcare system in tatters. Just 16 of Gaza’s 36 health facilities remain partially functioning.
INNUMBERS
1.2 million Polio vaccines the WHO plans to send to Gaza to prevent outbreak.
600,000 Children under the age of 8 to be targeted in vaccination drive.
70% Proportion of Gaza’s sanitation facilities damaged or destroyed.
1.9 million Palestinians in Gaza displaced multiple times since the conflict began.
Three of these facilities are in the north, seven in Gaza City, three in Deir Al-Balah, three in Khan Younis, and none in the southern city of Rafah, according to the US-based nongovernmental organization Physicians for Human Rights.
Javid Abdelmoneim, a medical team leader for Medecins Sans Frontieres, who was working at the Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza last month, told the organization “every day in July has been one shock after another.”
Recounting one particularly traumatic incident, he said: “I walked in behind a curtain, and there was a little girl alone, dying by herself. And that’s the outcome of a collapsed health system. A little 8-year-old girl, dying alone on a trolley in the emergency room.
“In a functioning health system, she would have been saved.”
Medical equipment are laid to waste at a hospital in Gaza that had been destroyed by Israeli bombardment. (AFP)
Despite calls from the WHO and other aid bodies for the warring parties in Gaza to allow “absolute freedom of movement” so that medics can roll out a vaccination campaign, the possibility of a ceasefire appears no closer.
On Wednesday, the Israeli military issued new evacuation orders for several parts of northern Gaza, including Beit Hanoun, Manshiyya and Sheikh Zayed.
Avichay Adraee, the Israeli army’s spokesperson, posted the evacuation orders on the social media platform X. He instructed the residents of Beit Hanoun to “relocate immediately” to Deir Al-Balah and Zawayda.
“Beit Hanoun area is still considered a dangerous combat zone,” he added.
The constant evacuation of Palestinian families in the Gaza Strip has hampered the rollout of a vaccination campaign. (AP)
Despite assurances that these areas would be treated as safe zones in which civilians could shelter, both Deir Al-Balah and Zawayda have come under regular Israeli attack in recent months.
The UN reported that while nowhere in Gaza is safe, 86 percent of the besieged Palestinian enclave is under Israeli evacuation orders. About 1.9 million of Gaza’s 2.1 million population have been displaced multiple times since Oct. 7.
“Nowhere is safe. Everywhere is a potential killing zone,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said at the opening of the UNRWA Pledging Conference on July 12.
The continuous movement of families in Gaza has made it difficult for aid agencies, which are already short of funds and struggling to reach affected populations, to locate and identify unvaccinated children.
In this file photo, a polio patient is fitted for an artificial limb at a rehabilitation center for prosthetics and treating polio in Gaza City. The war in Gaza has hampered the operation of the rehab center. (Getty Images)
The WHO’s polio specialist Jafari warned that the virus could have been circulating in Gaza since September, as the enclave offered “ideal conditions” for its transmission.
Before Oct. 7, polio vaccine coverage in the Occupied Palestinian Territories was estimated at 89 percent, according to the WHO.
Even if the planned 1.2 million vaccines are successfully brought into Gaza, it will be a “huge logistical challenge” to ensure their successful deployment, WHO official Andrea King told the BBC.
The vaccines must be stored within a limited temperature range from the moment they are manufactured until they are administered. Bringing these chilled vaccines into Gaza and keeping them at the required temperature would be a difficult undertaking at the best of times.
With a war going on, bringing chilled vaccines into Gaza and keeping them at the required temperature would be a difficult undertaking at the best of times, say WHO officials. (Getty Images)
The WHO’s Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Wednesday that a ceasefire or at least a few days of calm was essential to protect Gaza’s children.
As of July 7, the WHO has recorded a surge in infectious diseases, including 1 million cases of acute respiratory infections, 577,000 of acute watery diarrhea, 107,000 of acute jaundice syndrome, and 12,000 of bloody diarrhea.
It says this is primarily due to a lack of clean drinking water and the destruction of a critical water facility in Rafah, southern Gaza.
