PORT SUDAN: Sudan’s civil defense forces said on Sunday they had “fully contained” fires that erupted at the main fuel depot and other strategic sites in Port Sudan — the seat of the army-backed government which has come under drone attacks blamed on paramilitaries over the past week.
In a statement posted on the force’s Facebook page, civil defense director Osman Atta said the fires — involving “large quantities of petroleum reserves” — were brought under control following an intensive operation using “foam materials” and a “meticulously executed plan.”
The fires caused by a strike on the fuel depot last Monday had spread across “warehouses filled with fuel,” the Sudanese army-aligned authorities said, warning of a “potential disaster in the area.”
The Red Sea port city, which had been seen as a safe haven from the devastating two-year conflict between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, has been hit by daily drone strikes since last Sunday.
The long-range attacks have damaged several key facilities, including the country’s sole international civilian airport, its largest working fuel depot and the city’s main power station.
A military source told AFP on condition of anonymity on Saturday that air defenses in the towns of Jebeit and Sinkat — around 120 kilometers west of Port Sudan — shot down two drones that had been targeting facilities in the area.
Witnesses also reported on Sunday drone strikes targeting the airport in Atbara, a city in the northern state of River Nile.
Port Sudan is the main entry point for humanitarian aid into Sudan and UN chief Antonio Guterres warned the attacks “threaten to increase humanitarian needs and further complicate aid operations in the country,” his spokesman said.
More than two years of fighting have killed tens of thousands of people and uprooted 13 million in what the United Nations describes as the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.
Fires at key Sudan fuel depot ‘fully contained
https://arab.news/gnde4
Fires at key Sudan fuel depot ‘fully contained
- A military source told AFP on condition of anonymity on Saturday that air defenses in the towns of Jebeit and Sinkat
- Port Sudan is the main entry point for humanitarian aid into Sudan and UN chief Antonio Guterres
Israeli settlers forcibly enter Palestinian home in latest West Bank attack
- The settlers killed three sheep and injured four more, smashed a door and a window of the home
- Police said they arrested the five settlers on suspicion of trespassing onto Palestinian land
JERUSALEM: Israeli settlers attacked a Palestinian home in the south of the Israeli-occupied West Bank overnight, breaking in and killing sheep, a Palestinian official said Tuesday. It was the latest in a surge of attacks by settlers against Palestinians in the territory in recent months.
Israeli police said they arrested five settlers.
The settlers killed three sheep and injured four more, smashed a door and a window of the home, and fired tear gas inside, sending three Palestinian children under the age of 4 to the hospital, said Amir Dawood, who directs an office documenting such attacks within a Palestinian governmental body called the Wall and Settlement Resistance Commission.
Police said they arrested the five settlers on suspicion of trespassing onto Palestinian land, damaging property and dispensing pepper spray, not tear gas. They said they are investigating.
CCTV video from the attack in the town of As Samu’, shared by the commission, showed five masked settlers in dark clothing, some with batons, approaching the home and appearing to enter. Sounds of smashing are heard, as well as animal noises. Another video from inside shows masked figures appearing to strike sheep in the stable.
Photos of the aftermath, also shared by the commission, show smashed car windows and a shattered front door. Bloodied sheep lie dead as others stand with blood staining their wool. Inside the home, photos show broken glass and the furniture ransacked.
Dawood said it was the second settler attack on the family in less than two months. He called it “part of a systematic and ongoing pattern of settler violence targeting Palestinian civilians, their property and their means of livelihood, carried out with impunity under the protection of the Israeli occupation.”
During October’s olive harvest, settlers across the territory launched an average of eight attacks daily, the most since the United Nations humanitarian office began collecting data in 2006. The attacks continued in November, with the UN recording at least 136 by Nov. 24.
Israel occupied the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza — areas claimed by the Palestinians for a future state — in the 1967 war. It has settled over 500,000 Jews in the West Bank, in addition to over 200,000 in contested East Jerusalem.
Israel’s government is dominated by far-right proponents of the settler movement, including Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and Cabinet Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who oversees the nation’s police force. Earlier this week, Smotrich said the Israeli cabinet had approved a proposal for 19 new Jewish settlements, another blow to the possibility of a Palestinian state.
