DERNA: Abdel-Hamid Al-Hassadi survived the devastating flooding in eastern Libya, but he lost some 90 people from his extended family.
The 23-year-old law graduate rushed upstairs along with his mother and his elder brother, as heavy rains lashed the city of Derna on the evening of Sept. 10. Soon, torrents of water were washing away buildings next to them.
“We witnessed the magnitude of the catastrophe,” Al-Hassadi said in a phone interview, referring to the massive flooding that engulfed his city. “We have seen our neighbors’ dead bodies washing away in the floods.”
Heavy rains from Mediterranean storm Daniel caused the collapse of the two dams that spanned the narrow valley that divides the city. That sent a wall of water several meters high through its heart.
Ten days after the disaster, Al-Hassadi and thousands of others remain in Derna, most of them waiting for a word about relatives and loved ones. For Hassadi, it’s the 290 relatives still missing.
The floods inundated as much as a quarter of the city, officials say. Thousands of people were killed, with many dead bodies still under the rubble or at sea, according to search teams. Government officials and aid agencies have given varied death tolls.
The World Health Organization says a total of 3,958 deaths have been registered in hospitals, but a previous death toll given by the head of Libya’s Red Crescent said at least 11,300 were killed. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs says at least 9,000 people are still missing.
Bashir Omar, a spokesman for the International Committee of the Red Cross, said the fatalities are in the thousands, but he didn’t give a specific toll for the number of retrieved bodies, since there are many groups involved in the recovery effort.
Many Derna residents, including women and children, are spending all their time at collection points of bodies. They are desperate to know who is inside body bags carried by ambulances.
Inside a school in the western part of the city, authorities posted photos of the retrieved bodies.
Anas Aweis, a 24-year-old resident, lost two brothers and is still searching for his father and four cousins. He went to the Ummul Qura school in the Sheiha neighborhood to inspect the exhibited photos.
“It’s chaos,” he said after spending two hours waiting in lines. “We want to know where they buried them if they died.”
The floods have displaced at least 40,000 people in eastern Libya, including 30,000 in Derna, according to the UN’s migration agency. Many have moved to other cities across Libya, hosted by local communities or sheltered in schools. There are risks to staying, including potential infection by waterborne diseases.
Rana Ksaifi, assistant chief of mission in Libya for the UN’s refugee agency, said the floods have left “unfathomable levels of destruction,” and triggered new waves of displacement in the already conflict-stricken nation.
The houseplants on the rooftop of Abdul Salam Anwisi’s building survived the waters that reached up to his 4th-floor apartment. Anwisi’s and a few other families rode out the deluge on the roof, which overlooks the Mediterranean Sea. They thought they wouldn’t live to see daylight. Now, as he sifts through the water-damaged debris of his home, it’s unclear what comes next.
“God predetermined and he did what he wanted,” he said.
Others across the country are calling for Libya’s leaders to be taken to task.
Hundreds of angry protesters gathered Monday outside Derna’s main mosque, criticizing the government’s lack of preparation and response. They lashed out at the political class that controls the oil-rich nation since the ouster and killing of longtime dictator Muammar Qaddafi in 2011.
The North African country plunged into chaos after a NATO-backed uprising toppled and killed Qaddafi. For most of the past decade, Libya has been split between two rival administrations: one in the west backed by an array of lawless militias and armed groups, a second in the east, allied with the self-styled Libyan National Army, commanded by Gen. Khalifa Haftar. Neither government tolerates dissent.
Derna, as well as east and most of south Libya, is controlled by Haftar’s forces. However, funds for municipalities and other government agencies are controlled by the rival government in the capital, Tripoli.
Al-Hassadi, the law graduate, blamed local authorities for giving conflicting warnings to residents, leaving many defenseless. They asked residents to evacuate areas along the Mediterranean coast, but at the same time, they imposed a curfew, preventing people from leaving their homes.
“It was a mistake to impose a curfew,” he said.
The dams, Abu Mansour and Derna, were built by a Yugoslav construction company in the 1970s. They were meant to protect the city against heavy flooding, but years of no maintenance meant they were unable to keep the exceptional influx of water at bay.
Many Libyans are now calling for an international investigation and supervision of aid funds.
“All are corrupt here ... without exception,” said rights activist Tarik Lamloum.
Left behind and grieving, survivors of Libya floods call for accountability
https://arab.news/npx5n
Left behind and grieving, survivors of Libya floods call for accountability
- Heavy rains from Mediterranean storm Daniel caused the collapse of the two dams that spanned the narrow valley that divides the city. That sent a wall of water several meters high through its heart
- The floods inundated as much as a quarter of the city
A ceasefire holds in Syria but civilians live with fear and resentment
- The Arab-majority population in the areas that changed hands, Raqqa and Deir Ezzor, have celebrated the SDF’s withdrawal after largely resenting its rule
- But thousands of Kurdish residents of those areas fled, and non-Kurdish residents remain in Kurdish-majority enclaves still controlled by the SDF
QAMISHLI: Fighting this month between Syria’s government and Kurdish-led forces left civilians on either side of the frontline fearing for their future or harboring resentment as the country’s new leaders push forward with transition after years of civil war.
The fighting ended with government forces capturing most of the territory previously held by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces in the country’s northeast, and a fragile ceasefire is holding. SDF fighters will be absorbed into Syria’s army and police, ending months of disputes.
The Arab-majority population in the areas that changed hands, Raqqa and Deir Ezzor, have celebrated the SDF’s withdrawal after largely resenting its rule.
But thousands of Kurdish residents of those areas fled, and non-Kurdish residents remain in Kurdish-majority enclaves still controlled by the SDF. The International Organization for Migration has registered more than 173,000 people displaced.
Fleeing again and again
Subhi Hannan is among them, sleeping in a chilly schoolroom in the SDF-controlled city of Qamishli with his wife, three children and his mother after fleeing Raqqa.
The family is familiar with displacement after the years of civil war under former President Bashar Assad. They were first displaced from their hometown of Afrin in 2018, in an offensive by Turkish-backed rebels. Five years later, Hannan stepped on a land mine and lost his legs.
During the insurgent offensive that ousted Assad in December 2024, the family fled again, landing in Raqqa.
In the family’s latest flight this month, Hannan said their convoy was stopped by government fighters, who arrested most of their escort of SDF fighters and killed one. Hannan said fighters also took his money and cell phone and confiscated the car the family was riding in.
“I’m 42 years old and I’ve never seen something like this,” Hannan said. “I have two amputated legs, and they were hitting me.”
Now, he said, “I just want security and stability, whether it’s here or somewhere else.”
The father of another family in the convoy, Khalil Ebo, confirmed the confrontation and thefts by government forces, and said two of his sons were wounded in the crossfire.
Syria’s defense ministry in a statement acknowledged “a number of violations of established laws and disciplinary regulations” by its forces during this month’s offensive and said it is taking legal action against perpetrators.
A change from previous violence
The level of reported violence against civilians in the clashes between government and SDF fighters has been far lower than in fighting last year on Syria’s coast and in the southern province of Sweida. Hundreds of civilians from the Alawite and Druze religious minorities were killed in revenge attacks, many of them carried out by government-affiliated fighters.
This time, government forces opened “humanitarian corridors” in several areas for Kurdish and other civilians to flee. Areas captured by government forces, meanwhile, were largely Arab-majority with populations that welcomed their advance.
One term of the ceasefire says government forces should not enter Kurdish-majority cities and towns. But residents of Kurdish enclaves remain fearful.
The city of Kobani, surrounded by government-controlled territory, has been effectively besieged, with residents reporting cuts to electricity and water and shortages of essential supplies. A UN aid convoy entered the enclave for the first time Sunday.
On the streets of SDF-controlled Qamishli, armed civilians volunteered for overnight patrols to watch for any attack.
“We left and closed our businesses to defend our people and city,” said one volunteer, Suheil Ali. “Because we saw what happened in the coast and in Sweida and we don’t want that to be repeated here.”
Resentment remains
On the other side of the frontline in Raqqa, dozens of Arab families waited outside Al-Aqtan prison and the local courthouse over the weekend to see if loved ones would be released after SDF fighters evacuated the facilities.
Many residents of the region believe Arabs were unfairly targeted by the SDF and often imprisoned on trumped-up charges.
At least 126 boys under the age of 18 were released from the prison Saturday after government forces took it over.
Issa Mayouf from the village of Al-Hamrat, was waiting with his wife outside the courthouse Sunday for word about their 18-year-old son, who was arrested four months ago. Mayouf said he was accused of supporting a terrorist organization after SDF forces found Islamic chants as well as images on his phone mocking SDF commander Mazloum Abdi.
“SDF was a failure as a government,” Mayouf said “And there were no services. Look at the streets, the infrastructure, the education. It was all zero.”
Northeast Syria has oil and gas reserves and some of the country’s most fertile agricultural land. The SDF “had all the wealth of the country and they did nothing with it for the country,” Mayouf said.
Mona Yacoubian, director of the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said Kurdish civilians in besieged areas are terrified of “an onslaught and even atrocities” by government forces or allied groups.
But Arabs living in formerly SDF-controlled areas “also harbor deep fears and resentment toward the Kurds based on accusations of discrimination, intimidation, forced recruitment and even torture while imprisoned,” she said.
“The experience of both sides underscores the deep distrust and resentment across Syria’s diverse society that threatens to derail the country’s transition,” Yacoubian said.
She added it’s now on the government of interim Syrian President Ahmad Al-Sharaa to strike a balance between demonstrating its power and creating space for the country’s anxious minorities to have a say in their destiny.
