Negligence, not arson, appears to have caused the worst forest fire in Israel’s history, police said on Saturday as firefighters from around the world worked to quell the deadly blaze for a third consecutive day.
Authorities arrested two teenage brothers in connection with the fire, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said. He refused to provide further details, but said: “We’re talking negligence at the moment.”
CONFLICTING REPORTS
There have been conflicting reports about what sparked the fire.
Israel Radio, citing unidentified police officials, said early on Saturday that the blaze likely was started by a family that failed to extinguish a picnic fire. Israeli TV, meanwhile, has reported that kids holding a bonfire may have been the source.
The blaze, which broke out on Thursday, tore through the hilly pine Carmel Forest that clings to the mountain ridge above the northern city of Haifa, Israel’s third-largest city. It also lapped at the edges of small outlying communities.
The fire has killed 41 people — most of them prison guards whose bus was engulfed by flames as they rushed to evacuate a prison. A 16-year-old volunteer firefighter also died after joining the rescue mission.
More than 17,000 people had been evacuated from their homes before officials gave some of them the all-clear to return on Saturday. Firefighter spokesman Yoram Levy said the blaze had subsided, but added that he “can’t say it’s under control.”
Critics contrasted Israel’s helplessness in the face of a wildfire with its reputation for swift and effective responses to disasters abroad.
“We are experts in some tragedies but it seems we were not really prepared for an event related to fire,” said Hanan Goder, a spokesman for the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which is helping to coordinate the international response to the fire.
UNDER-EQUIPPED
Israeli firefighters have complained for years of undersized crews, outdated equipment and minimal supplies. The country only has 1,400 firefighters, far below the worldwide average. And while it has a highly sophisticated air force, it doesn’t have a single firefighting plane. It ran out of flame retardants on the first day of the blaze, Levy said.
In the small artist community of Ein Hod, one woman desperately tried to protect her house from the encroaching flames with only a garden hose.
Ukraine’s military intelligence agency and the Pentagon on Monday said that some North Korean troops have been killed during combat against Ukrainian forces in Russia’s Kursk border region. Those are the first reported casualties since the US and Ukraine announced that North Korea had sent 10,000 to 12,000 troops to Russia to help it in the almost three-year war. Ukraine’s military intelligence agency said that about 30 North Korean troops were killed or wounded during a battle with the Ukrainian army at the weekend. The casualties occurred around three villages in Kursk, where Russia has for four months been trying to quash a
FREEDOM NO MORE: Today, protests in Macau are just a memory after Beijing launched measures over the past few years that chilled free speech A decade ago, the elegant cobblestone streets of Macau’s Tap Seac Square were jam-packed with people clamouring for change and government accountability — the high-water mark for the former Portuguese colony’s political awakening. Now as Macau prepares to mark the 25th anniversary of its handover to China tomorrow, the territory’s democracy movement is all but over and the protests of 2014 no more than a memory. “Macau’s civil society is relatively docile and obedient, that’s the truth,” said Au Kam-san (歐錦新), 67, a schoolteacher who became one of Macau’s longest-serving pro-democracy legislators. “But if that were totally true, we wouldn’t
ROYAL TARGET: After Prince Andrew lost much of his income due to his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein, he became vulnerable to foreign agents, an author said British lawmakers failed to act on advice to tighten security laws that could have prevented an alleged Chinese spy from targeting Britain’s Prince Andrew, a former attorney general has said. Dominic Grieve, a former lawmaker who chaired the British Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) until 2019, said ministers were advised five years ago to introduce laws to criminalize foreign agents, but failed to do so. Similar laws exist in the US and Australia. “We remain without an important weapon in our armory,” Grieve said. “We asked for [this law] in the context of the Russia inquiry report” — which accused the government
TRUDEAU IN TROUBLE: US president-elect Donald Trump reacted to Chrystia Freeland’s departure, saying: ‘Her behavior was totally toxic, and not at all conducive to making deals Canadian Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland on Monday quit in a surprise move after disagreeing with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau over US president-elect Donald Trump’s tariff threats. The resignation of Freeland, 56, who also stepped down as finance minister, marked the first open dissent against Trudeau from within his Cabinet, and could threaten his hold on power. Liberal leader Trudeau lags 20 points in polls behind his main rival, Conservative Pierre Poilievre, who has tried three times since September to topple the government and force a snap election. “It’s not been an easy day,” Trudeau said at a fundraiser Monday evening, but
RSS