Tunisia's president appears to blame Libyan floods on 'Zionist movement'

Kais Said, the Tunisian president, did not elaborate on his remarks. Photo: Fethi Belaid/AFP Pool

Apparently, the Tunisian president is to blame. catastrophic flooding in Libya last week in connection with Israel as he suggested Storm Daniel had a secret «Zionist» influence.

Case Said made an anti-Semitic remark Monday night while commenting on the storms and subsequent floods in Derne. , eastern Libya, where thousands of people were killed.

“Didn’t they wonder about the name? Daniel is a Jewish prophet,” Mr. Said said, referring to Storm Daniel. «The Zionist movement has permeated consciousness and thinking, from Daniel to Abraham.»

He did not elaborate on his remarks, which were broadcast by his office. His reference to «Abraham» appears to refer to the Abraham Accords, a series of normalization treaties between Israel and a number of Arab states, including the United Arab Emirates.

Mr Said and his government are strongly opposed to normalizing relations with Israel, which is working to bring Saudi Arabia into the accords. The Tunisian leader has described efforts to normalize relations with Israel as “high treason.”

Although Daniel is the Title on Hebrew, it is also popular in Western countries — and the storm itself was named by the Greek National Meteorological Service in Greece.

This is not the first time Mr. Said has made anti-Semitic comments, according to the Times of Israel.

In 2021, the Conference of European Rabbis said the Tunisian leader heard complaints during a meeting with residents. Tunisia said Jews were to blame for «the country's instability.»

More than 10,000 people are missing or killed after Hurricane Daniel brought torrential rain to the eastern port city of Dherma. Several dams have collapsed.

Thousands of corpses have been found washed ashore by the waves, raising fears that decomposing bodies in the area could cause an epidemic of disease.

There is widespread anger in Libya. on the scale of the disaster: UN officials said the death toll would have been significantly lower if the abandoned dams had not collapsed.

Hundreds of Libyans took out their fury on Abdulmenam al-Ghaiti, who was mayor of Derna at the time of the disaster, during rare protests in Derna. The mayor's house was also burned by demonstrators.