UN humanitarian chief appeals for aid access as Gaza faces ‘total’ blockade

People walk amid the rubble of a building destroyed in an overnight Israeli strike in Jabalia, in the northern Gaza Strip on March 18, 2025. (AFP)
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Updated 18 March 2025
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UN humanitarian chief appeals for aid access as Gaza faces ‘total’ blockade

  • ‘Worst fears materialized’ after Israel resumes airstrikes, issues new evacuation orders
  • Renewal of hostilities has undermined gains during ceasefire, Security Council told

NEW YORK: The UN under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs warned the UN Security Council on Tuesday that the aid crisis in Gaza is worsening, as Israel resumed airstrikes across the territory and continued to block vital supplies.

“Overnight our worst fears materialized,” Tom Fletcher told council members.

“Airstrikes resumed across the entire Gaza Strip. (Reports) of hundreds of people killed. New evacuation orders issued by Israeli forces. Once again, the people of Gaza are living in abject fear.”

Fletcher added the situation had returned to chaos, undermining the modest gains made during a recent ceasefire.

Humanitarian efforts in Gaza were severely hampered following the resumption of hostilities, he said.

“Today, I am distressed to report that in addition to the intense airstrikes that have resumed, since March 2 Israeli authorities have cut off the entry of all lifesaving supplies — food, medicines, fuel, cooking gas — for 2.1 million people,” Fletcher said.

“Our repeated requests to collect aid sitting at Karem Shalom crossing have also been systematically rejected. No further hostages have been released. Only medical evacuations and humanitarian staff rotations continued. Even that came to a halt today.”

The blockade has worsened living conditions, with essential services such as clean water becoming increasingly scarce.

Fletcher highlighted that the shutdown of Gaza’s desalination plant has left 600,000 people without access to safe drinking water.

“The current suspension of aid and commercial materials is reversing the progress achieved during the brief ceasefire. Survival resources are now being rationed,” he said, adding that vegetable prices in northern Gaza have tripled, while bakeries have closed due to shortages of cooking gas and supplies.

The World Health Organization has warned that public health risks remain very high, including for communicable diseases resulting from overcrowding and poor sanitation.

Fletcher again raised concerns about the growing challenges facing humanitarian workers, with the new restrictions imposed on international NGOs since the Knesset legislation banning the aid agency UNRWA took effect on Jan. 30.

“UNRWA international staff are no longer able to rotate into and out of Gaza,” he said.

Fletcher said that on March 9, Israeli authorities introduced new registration rules for international NGOs delivering humanitarian aid to Palestinians in the territory. If enforced, these will impose strict conditions and significantly disrupt aid operations.

“The Israeli Knesset is also considering a bill to impose considerable taxation on donations from third states to Israeli NGOs, including humanitarian and human rights groups.

“If implemented, this would further erode the number of partners with the capacity to implement protection interventions.

“Many Israeli NGOs are engaged on legal cases involving home demolitions and forced evictions. They also provide protective presence activities related to settler violence.”

Fletcher underscored the success of the 42-day ceasefire, which allowed deliveries from more than 4,000 aid trucks per week, the release of 30 hostages, and the distribution of essential resources to over 2 million people.

“This proves what’s possible when we’re allowed to do our job,” Fletcher said. “We cannot accept a return to pre-ceasefire conditions or the complete denial of humanitarian relief.”

The UN official also expressed grave concern about escalating violence in the West Bank, where 95 Palestinians, including 17 children, have been killed since the beginning of the year, and over 40,000 Palestinians forced from their homes by Israeli military operations.

Fletcher called for immediate action, urging that humanitarian aid and commercial goods be allowed to enter Gaza, and that hostilities cease with the renewal of a ceasefire agreement.

He warned that without funding for the humanitarian response, which has received only 4 percent of the required financial support, the situation will worsen.

“Blocking food, water, and medicine for people who need them is unconscionable,” Fletcher said. “It goes against international humanitarian law and must be stopped immediately.”


World Food Programme to reduce food support in Sudan due to funding shortages

Updated 13 sec ago
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World Food Programme to reduce food support in Sudan due to funding shortages

  • The United Nations agency warns that it may have to reduce the number of people it can help across the country, from May, if more funding does not come through from donors
GENEVA:The World Food Programme warned on Friday it is facing a funding shortfall that could impact its ability to supply support to people facing acute food shortages in Sudan within weeks.
The United Nations agency warns that it may have to reduce the number of people it can help across the country, from May, if more funding does not come through from donors.
It is seeking $698 million to help 7 million people from May through September.

Morocco volunteers on Sahara clean-up mission

Updated 30 min 45 sec ago
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Morocco volunteers on Sahara clean-up mission

  • It may be the gateway to the vast Sahara desert, but that does not mean it’s free of that modern scourge of the environment — the rubbish humanity discards

M’HAMID EL GHIZLANE:It may be the gateway to the vast Sahara desert, but that does not mean it’s free of that modern scourge of the environment — the rubbish humanity discards.
In southern Morocco, volunteers are hunting for waste embedded in the sand, and they do not have to look far.
Bottles, plastic bags — “there are all kinds,” noted one helper who has joined the initiative cleaning up the edge of a village bordering the Sahara.
The initiative marks the 20th International Nomads Festival, which is held in mid-April every year in M’Hamid El Ghizlane in Zagora province in southeast Morocco.
Around 50 people, gloved and equipped with rubbish bags, toiled away for five hours — and collected 400 to 600 kilos of waste, the organizers estimated.
“Clean-up initiatives usually focus on beaches and forests,” festival founder Noureddine Bougrab, who lives in the village of around 6,600 people, told AFP.
“But the desert also suffers from pollution.”
The campaign brings together artists, activists and foreign tourists, and is a call for the “world’s deserts to be protected,” said Bougrab, 46.
He said the clean-up began at the northern entrance of the village, “which was badly affected by pollution,” and extended through to the other end of town and the beginning of the “Great Desert.”
The rubbish is “mainly linked to the massive production of plastic products, low recycling rates and atmospheric pollutants carried by the wind,” said anthropologist Mustapha Naimi.
Morocco has a population of almost 37 million and they generate about 8.2 million tons of household waste each year, according to the Ministry of Energy Transition and Sustainable Development.
“This is equivalent to 811 times the weight of the Eiffel Tower — enough to fill 2,780 Olympic swimming pools with compacted waste,” said Hassan Chouaouta, an international expert in sustainable strategic development.
Of this amount, “between six and seven percent” is recycled, he said.


Their morning alarm went off “early,” according to one volunteer, New York-based French photographer Ronan Le Floch, who said the initiative’s aim was “to show that it’s important to take care of this type of environment.”
Another helper was Ousmane Ag Oumar, a 35-year-old Malian member of Imarhan Timbuktu, a Tuareg blues group.
He called the waste a direct danger to livestock, which are essential to the subsistence of nomadic communities.
Naimi, the anthropologist, agreed. “Plastic waste harms the Saharan environment as it contaminates the land, pasture, rivers and nomadic areas,” he said.
Pastoral nomadism is a millennia-old way of life based on seasonal mobility and available pasture for livestock.
But it is on the wane in Morocco, weakened by climate change and with nomadic communities now tending to stay in one place.
The most recent official census of nomads in Morocco dates to 2014, and returned a population of 25,274 — 63 percent lower than a decade earlier in 2004.
Mohammed Mahdi, a professor of rural sociology, said the country’s nomads had “not benefited from much state support, compared to subsidies granted to agriculture, especially for products intended for export.”
“We give very little to nomadic herders, and a good number have gone bankrupt and given up,” he said.
Mohamed Oujaa, 50, is leader of The Sand Pigeons, a group that specializes in the “gnawa” music practiced in the Maghreb by the descendants of black slaves.
For him, a clean environment is vital for future generations, and he hopes the initiative will be “just the first in a series of campaigns to clean up the desert.”


Syria’s new foreign minister to appear at the UN in his first US visit

Asaad al-Shibani speaks during the 163rd GCC Ministerial Council meeting with Syria in Mecca. (AFP)
Updated 23 min 9 sec ago
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Syria’s new foreign minister to appear at the UN in his first US visit

  • The three-starred flag that had previously been used by opposition groups has replaced the two-starred flag of the Assad era as the country’s official emblem
  • European Union has begun to roll back its sanctions

BEIRUT: Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad Al-Shibani was set to raise his country’s new flag at the United Nations headquarters in New York Friday and to attend a UN Security Council briefing, the first public appearance by a high-ranking Syrian government official in the United States since the fall of former President Bashar Assad in a lightning rebel offensive in December.
The three-starred flag that had previously been used by opposition groups has replaced the two-starred flag of the Assad era as the country’s official emblem.
The new authorities in Damascus have been courting Washington in hopes of receiving relief from harsh sanctions that were imposed by the US and its allies in the wake of Assad’s brutal crackdown on anti-government protests in 2011 that spiraled into a civil war.
A delegation of Syrian officials traveled to the United States this week to attend World Bank and International Monetary Fund meetings in Washington and UN meetings in New York. It was unclear if Trump administration officials would meet with Al-Shibani during the visit.
The Trump administration has yet to officially recognize the current Syrian government, led by Ahmad Al-Sharaa, an Islamist former insurgent who led the offensive that toppled Assad. Washington has also so far left the sanctions in place, although it has provided temporary relief to some restrictions. The militant group Al-Sharaa led, Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham, remains a US-designated terrorist organization.
Two Republican members of the US Congress, Rep. Marlin Stutzman of Indiana and Rep. Cory Mills of Florida, arrived in Damascus last week on an unofficial visit organized by a Syrian-American nonprofit and met with Al-Sharaa and other government officials.
Mills told The Associated Press before meeting with Al-Sharaa that “ultimately, it’s going to be the president’s decision” to lift sanctions or not, although he said that “Congress can advise.”
Mills later told Bloomberg News that he had discussed the US conditions for sanctions relief with Al-Sharaa, including ensuring the destruction of chemical weapons left over from the Assad era, coordinating on counter-terrorism, making a plan to deal with foreign militants who fought alongside the armed opposition to Assad, and providing assurances to Israel that Syria would not pose a threat.
He also said that Al-Sharaa had said Syria could normalize relations with Israel “under the right conditions,” without specifying what those conditions are.
Other Western countries have warmed up to the new Syrian authorities more quickly. The British government on Thursday lifted sanctions against a dozen Syrian entities, including government departments and media outlets, and the European Union has begun to roll back its sanctions.


Iraq farmers turn to groundwater to boost desert yield

Updated 35 min 30 sec ago
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Iraq farmers turn to groundwater to boost desert yield

  • Farmer Hadi Saheb cannot wait to see his wheat fields flourish in the heart of the desert after he tapped into groundwater reserves in water-starved Iraq

NAJAF: Farmer Hadi Saheb cannot wait to see his wheat fields flourish in the heart of the desert after he tapped into groundwater reserves in water-starved Iraq.
He is just one of many Iraqis who have turned to drilling wells in the desert to help sustain the country’s agriculture.
It is a risky move that threatens to deplete the groundwater in a nation already battered by frequent drought and scarce rainfall.
Although Iraq’s fertile plains traditionally stretch along the once-mighty Tigris and Euphrates — the two rivers whose levels have plummeted — Saheb’s vast lands lie in the heart of the southern Najaf desert.
“Year after year the drought worsens, and the desertification intensifies,” said the 46-year-old, dressed in a white abaya as a duststorm swept through the area.
So he has turned to groundwater, taking advantage of a government initiative.
This leases desert land to farmers at a symbolic price of one dollar per dunum (0.25 hectares in Iraq’s measurement), provides subsidised irrigation systems, and buys their harvest at a preferential rate.
Now that he doesn’t have to rely solely on rainfall, Saheb said he cultivates 20 times more land than before, and his harvest has increased to 250 tons.
“It would be impossible to continue without groundwater, which we cannot extract without drilling wells,” he said.
Like many other farmers, Saheb has upgraded his irrigation techniques.


He now relies on a center-pivot method involving equipment rotating in a circle to water crops through sprinklers.
This uses at least 50 percent less water than flooding — the vastly more wasteful traditional way used for millennia, during which the land is submerged.
According to the agriculture ministry, Iraq cultivated 3.1 million dunums (775,000 hectares) this winter using groundwater and modern irrigation systems, while the rivers watered only two million dunums.
In Najaf, desert farming has expanded significantly.
According to Moneim Shahid from Najaf’s agriculture authorities, crop yields have been boosted by new irrigation methods, tougher seeds and fertilizers suitable for arid soils.
Shahid said he expects a harvest in Najaf this year of at least 1.7 tons of wheat per dunum in the desert, compared with 1.3 tons in areas irrigated by rivers.
Last year Iraq had a very good harvest, exceeding self-sufficiency with a production of 6.4 million tons of wheat, according to agriculture ministry figures.
Religious institutions such as the Imam Hussein Shrine in the holy city of Karbala back the authorities and also support desert farming.
Qahtan Awaz from the shrine’s agriculture department said the institution, which employs families to farm desert areas, is cultivating 1,000 hectares and aims to more than triple that amount.
Today, groundwater reservoirs help mitigate agricultural losses caused by drought, an already frequent phenomenon in Iraq that is worsened by a warming planet.
But preserving those resources is proving to be a challenge.
Shahid from Najaf’s agriculture authorities, said “we should be vigilant” in protecting groundwater, calling it “a strategic reserve for future generations.”
Its use “should be rationed ... and sprinklers could help regulate consumption,” he said.


The Najaf desert lies above the Umm el-Radhuma and the Dammam aquifers, which Iraq shares with neighboring Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.
Water levels in both aquifers have declined, according to the United Nations which has also voiced caution that aquifers worldwide are depleting faster than they can be replenished naturally.
A 2023 UN report warned that Saudi Arabia used much of its groundwater to grow wheat in the desert, depleting more than 80 percent of its resources and forcing authorities to stop cultivating wheat after 2016.
Sameh Al-Muqdadi, a water politics and climate security expert, warned that Iraq’s groundwater levels have already dropped.
Water used to be found 50 or 100 meters deep (165-330 feet), but today wells are dug 300 meters deep, he said.
“People believe that these resources will stay forever... which is not true,” Muqdadi warned.
Authorities have no estimates for Iraq’s groundwater, and the most recent figures date back to the 1970s, he said.
“If you don’t have any estimation, you cannot manage your resources.”
“Groundwater is a contingency measure, and it should be used only in urgent cases” such as droughts “to sustain food security only,” not to expand farmland for commercial purposes, Muqdadi said.
But unfortunately, “this is what we have nowadays.”


Iran’s FM Araghchi to head to Oman for nuclear talks with US

Updated 35 min 19 sec ago
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Iran’s FM Araghchi to head to Oman for nuclear talks with US

  • Abbas Araghchi will be leading a diplomatic and technical-expert delegation for indirect discussions with the US side
  • President Donald Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, will represent the United States in the talks

TEHRAN: Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi is set to leave for Oman on Friday for nuclear talks with the United States, after both sides reported progress in the first two rounds.
Araghchi will be leading what foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei described as a diplomatic and technical-expert delegation for indirect discussions with the US side.
President Donald Trump’s special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, will represent the United States in the talks scheduled on Saturday.
The meeting follows two earlier rounds of Omani-mediated talks in Muscat and Rome starting on April 12.
The third round will include expert-level technical talks over Iran’s nuclear program, with Michael Anton, who serves as the State Department’s head of policy planning, lead technical talks on the US side.
Iran’s Tasnim news agency meanwhile reported that deputy foreign ministers Kazem Gharibabadi and Majid Takht-Ravanchi will lead the technical talks on the Iranian side.
Baqaei said Friday that “progress in the negotiations requires the demonstration of goodwill, seriousness, and realism by the other side.”
Araghchi said in an interview this week that Iran “will enter the negotiations seriously on Saturday, and if the other party also enters seriously, there is potential for progress.”
Trump wrote a letter to Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in March, urging talks while warning of potential military action if diplomacy fails.