ALGIERS: Eight babies were killed when a fire ripped through a maternity hospital in eastern Algeria before dawn on Tuesday, emergency services said.
“We managed to rescue 11 babies, 107 women and 28 staff” after the 3:50 am (0250 GMT) fire in the hospital in Oued Souf, 500 kilometers (300 miles) southeast of Algiers, spokesman Captain Nassim Bernaoui told AFP.
“Unfortunately we regret the deaths of eight babies, some from burns and others from smoke inhalation,” he said, adding that the entire hospital had been evacuated.
Dozens of fire engines were deployed to bring the blaze under control.
The cause of the fire was not immediately clear, Bernaoui said.
According to Algerian public television, preliminary enquiries suggested an electric anti-mosquito device short-circuited and caused the fire.
Images of charred children’s wards were published by local media. Private television channel Ennahar TV aired footage of Oued Souf residents protesting outside the hospital watched by the security forces.
An Ennahar TV presenter read poignant testimony from a father of two of the babies killed: “After seven months of marriage, my wife gave birth to twins in the night, (they) died in the early morning.”
This was the first time “in memory” that infants had died in a hospital fire, several doctors told AFP.
It was the second blaze to hit the maternity hospital in Oued Souf in 16 months. A fire in May last year caused significant damage but no casualties.
Prime Minister Noureddine Bedoui ordered an inquiry and sent Health Minister Mohamed Miraoui to the scene, Algerian television reported.
Bedoui offered his condolences to the families.
The health minister ordered the suspension of the district health director, the director of the hospital and the hospital’s security team, Algerian television reported.
A quarter of Algeria’s budget is allocated to the health sector. It has 70,000 public hospital beds and 10,000 private ones, for a population that passed 43 million in January.
For the past four years, Algeria has experienced a baby boom, with nearly a million newborns a year.
The resurgence of the birth rate comes after a sharp fall during the 1990s, when a decade-long civil war killed 200,000 Algerians.
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Eight babies killed in Algeria hospital fire: emergency services
Eight babies killed in Algeria hospital fire: emergency services
- Dozens of fire engines were deployed to bring the blaze under control
- Images of charred children’s wards were published by local media
UN says Israeli actions raising ‘ethnic cleansing’ fears in West Bank, Gaza
GENEVA: Israel’s increased attacks and forcible transfers of Palestinians “raise concerns over ethnic cleansing” in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, the United Nations said Thursday.
The UN human rights office said the cumulative impact of Israel’s military conduct during the war in Gaza, plus its blockade of the territory, had inflicted living conditions “increasingly incompatible with Palestinians’ continued existence as a group in Gaza.”
“Intensified attacks, the methodical destruction of entire neighborhoods and the denial of humanitarian assistance appeared to aim at a permanent demographic shift in Gaza,” the office said in a report.
“This, together with forcible transfers, which appear to aim at a permanent displacement, raise concerns over ethnic cleansing in Gaza and the West Bank.”
The report looked at November 1, 2024 to October 31, 2025.
In the occupied West Bank and annexed East Jerusalem, the report said the “systematic use of unlawful force” by Israeli security forces, “widespread” arbitrary detention and the “extensive unlawful demolition” of Palestinian homes was being carried out to “systematically discriminate, oppress, control and dominate the Palestinian people.”
“These violations were “altering the character, status and demographic composition of the occupied West Bank, raising serious concerns of ethnic cleansing,” it said.
- ‘Inhumane choice’ -
In Gaza, the report condemned the continued killing and maiming of “unprecedented numbers of civilians,” the spread of famine, and destruction of the “remaining civilian infrastructure.”
During the 12 months covered in the report, at least 463 Palestinians, including 157 children, starved to death in Gaza, it said.
“Palestinians faced the inhumane choice of either starving to death or risking being killed while trying to get food,” said the report.
“The situation of famine and malnutrition was the direct result of actions taken by the Israeli government,” with the deaths and suffering from hunger “foreseeable and repeatedly foretold.”
Across the reporting period, Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups continued to hold Israeli and foreign hostages seized on October 7, 2023 — dead or alive — as “bargaining tools.”
The rights office said the hostages’ treatment amounted to war crimes.
“Israeli forces, Hamas, and other Palestinian armed groups committed serious violations of international humanitarian law in Gaza, gross violations and abuses of international human rights law, and atrocity crimes,” the report concluded.
Impunity ‘kills’
Last week, UN rights chief Volker Turk warned that the world was witnessing “rapid steps to change permanently the demography of the occupied Palestinian territory.”
On Tuesday, Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich vowed to encourage “emigration” from the Palestinian territories.
And on Wednesday, UN Under-Secretary-General Rosemary DiCarlo warned the Security Council that steps by Israel to tighten control of areas of the West Bank administered by the Palestinian Authority amount to “gradual de facto annexation.”
Thursday’s rights office report concluded that considered together, Israeli practices “indicated a concerted and accelerating effort to consolidate annexation of large parts of the Occupied Palestinian Territory and to deny Palestinians’ right to self-determination.”
The report said there was a pervasive climate of impunity for serious violations of international law by the Israeli authorities in the Palestinian territories.
“Impunity is not abstract — it kills. Accountability is indispensable. It is the prerequisite for a just and durable peace in Palestine and Israel,” Turk said in a statement.
The UN human rights office said the cumulative impact of Israel’s military conduct during the war in Gaza, plus its blockade of the territory, had inflicted living conditions “increasingly incompatible with Palestinians’ continued existence as a group in Gaza.”
“Intensified attacks, the methodical destruction of entire neighborhoods and the denial of humanitarian assistance appeared to aim at a permanent demographic shift in Gaza,” the office said in a report.
“This, together with forcible transfers, which appear to aim at a permanent displacement, raise concerns over ethnic cleansing in Gaza and the West Bank.”
The report looked at November 1, 2024 to October 31, 2025.
In the occupied West Bank and annexed East Jerusalem, the report said the “systematic use of unlawful force” by Israeli security forces, “widespread” arbitrary detention and the “extensive unlawful demolition” of Palestinian homes was being carried out to “systematically discriminate, oppress, control and dominate the Palestinian people.”
“These violations were “altering the character, status and demographic composition of the occupied West Bank, raising serious concerns of ethnic cleansing,” it said.
- ‘Inhumane choice’ -
In Gaza, the report condemned the continued killing and maiming of “unprecedented numbers of civilians,” the spread of famine, and destruction of the “remaining civilian infrastructure.”
During the 12 months covered in the report, at least 463 Palestinians, including 157 children, starved to death in Gaza, it said.
“Palestinians faced the inhumane choice of either starving to death or risking being killed while trying to get food,” said the report.
“The situation of famine and malnutrition was the direct result of actions taken by the Israeli government,” with the deaths and suffering from hunger “foreseeable and repeatedly foretold.”
Across the reporting period, Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups continued to hold Israeli and foreign hostages seized on October 7, 2023 — dead or alive — as “bargaining tools.”
The rights office said the hostages’ treatment amounted to war crimes.
“Israeli forces, Hamas, and other Palestinian armed groups committed serious violations of international humanitarian law in Gaza, gross violations and abuses of international human rights law, and atrocity crimes,” the report concluded.
Impunity ‘kills’
Last week, UN rights chief Volker Turk warned that the world was witnessing “rapid steps to change permanently the demography of the occupied Palestinian territory.”
On Tuesday, Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich vowed to encourage “emigration” from the Palestinian territories.
And on Wednesday, UN Under-Secretary-General Rosemary DiCarlo warned the Security Council that steps by Israel to tighten control of areas of the West Bank administered by the Palestinian Authority amount to “gradual de facto annexation.”
Thursday’s rights office report concluded that considered together, Israeli practices “indicated a concerted and accelerating effort to consolidate annexation of large parts of the Occupied Palestinian Territory and to deny Palestinians’ right to self-determination.”
The report said there was a pervasive climate of impunity for serious violations of international law by the Israeli authorities in the Palestinian territories.
“Impunity is not abstract — it kills. Accountability is indispensable. It is the prerequisite for a just and durable peace in Palestine and Israel,” Turk said in a statement.
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