Salam my friends
I am very touched by the concern and kindness you have all shown to me. I really appreciate it!!
As I have told some of you in PM's, The unprecedented deadly floods took place in Eastern Libya. My immediate family and I are OK. We live in western Libya, about 700 miles away from the disaster area.
Estimated 18 - 21 thousand people are missing and the confirmed dead are now approaching 6000 people. This has never happened in the history of Libya that we know of in centuries. Whole cities, towns and villages in the east were swept to sea! Poor infrastructure, inept government, military war criminals in charge, corruption, etc. are all the culprits for making what could have been only an emergency into a catastrophe of epic proportions.
What made it much worse was the collapse of two dams that were badly neglected and couldn't stand the pressure of water. These two dams were built in one "Wadi" (seasonal river) in the early 70's. The first one collapsed letting all water down the mounting causing the second one to collapse also. The water simply washed away everything that stood in its way to sea. The biggest hit area was "Derna," a city at the bottom of the mountain. The wadi flows in the middle of the city to the sea. Most of this city, Derna, was destroyed beyond recognition. People either died under the wreckage of their homes or were swept out to the sea. It wasn't only Derna that got hit hard, other towns, cities, villages got hit also with lots of damage and dead but not as bad or in same scale as Derna. The population of Derna is only 120K people.
Our needs in Libya aren't "food" or medicine really since we have all of that. Our biggest issue now is how to manage the disaster and to search for the dead bodies. We have NO experience of any kind in such work at all. We can't manage any natural disasters or anything. The 42 year rule of Qaddafi and the following 12 years after his demise didn't do anything to build know-how or skills in any field. Chaos and despair is what we have.
Add to this most terrible catastrophe, the eastern region of the country is ruled by a war criminal who initiated several wars in the last few years trying to take control of the country. He as been unsuccessful in trying to take over the main part of Libya in the west but is still in control of a substantial part of the country. He aligned himself with the Wagner group from Russia and other mercenaries and countries that want to set a foothold in Libya (France, UAE, Egypt) and has caused lots of damage and loss of life all over the country. Some of you already know that I lost my home and most of my belongings in the war in 2019/20 and was homeless for a very long time.
Among several stories about what happened, it is reported that this war criminal, Gen. Haftar, didn't allow the people of Derna to evacuate from the city before the disaster struck and let them face the most terrible event on their own. Haftar is well known to hate Derna and was quoted on TV on several occasions that he wanted to deprive them of life by strangling them. Derna was the primary city that resisted the take over by Haftar and fought him with great intensity. Haftar didn't spare any effort to take over Derna and brought in foreign fighters from Egypt, Russia, etc. to wipe out all resistance there. Haftar is dual citizen, US/Libyan.
May Allah have mercy on all of us.
I am very touched by the concern and kindness you have all shown to me. I really appreciate it!!
As I have told some of you in PM's, The unprecedented deadly floods took place in Eastern Libya. My immediate family and I are OK. We live in western Libya, about 700 miles away from the disaster area.
Estimated 18 - 21 thousand people are missing and the confirmed dead are now approaching 6000 people. This has never happened in the history of Libya that we know of in centuries. Whole cities, towns and villages in the east were swept to sea! Poor infrastructure, inept government, military war criminals in charge, corruption, etc. are all the culprits for making what could have been only an emergency into a catastrophe of epic proportions.
What made it much worse was the collapse of two dams that were badly neglected and couldn't stand the pressure of water. These two dams were built in one "Wadi" (seasonal river) in the early 70's. The first one collapsed letting all water down the mounting causing the second one to collapse also. The water simply washed away everything that stood in its way to sea. The biggest hit area was "Derna," a city at the bottom of the mountain. The wadi flows in the middle of the city to the sea. Most of this city, Derna, was destroyed beyond recognition. People either died under the wreckage of their homes or were swept out to the sea. It wasn't only Derna that got hit hard, other towns, cities, villages got hit also with lots of damage and dead but not as bad or in same scale as Derna. The population of Derna is only 120K people.
Our needs in Libya aren't "food" or medicine really since we have all of that. Our biggest issue now is how to manage the disaster and to search for the dead bodies. We have NO experience of any kind in such work at all. We can't manage any natural disasters or anything. The 42 year rule of Qaddafi and the following 12 years after his demise didn't do anything to build know-how or skills in any field. Chaos and despair is what we have.
Add to this most terrible catastrophe, the eastern region of the country is ruled by a war criminal who initiated several wars in the last few years trying to take control of the country. He as been unsuccessful in trying to take over the main part of Libya in the west but is still in control of a substantial part of the country. He aligned himself with the Wagner group from Russia and other mercenaries and countries that want to set a foothold in Libya (France, UAE, Egypt) and has caused lots of damage and loss of life all over the country. Some of you already know that I lost my home and most of my belongings in the war in 2019/20 and was homeless for a very long time.
Among several stories about what happened, it is reported that this war criminal, Gen. Haftar, didn't allow the people of Derna to evacuate from the city before the disaster struck and let them face the most terrible event on their own. Haftar is well known to hate Derna and was quoted on TV on several occasions that he wanted to deprive them of life by strangling them. Derna was the primary city that resisted the take over by Haftar and fought him with great intensity. Haftar didn't spare any effort to take over Derna and brought in foreign fighters from Egypt, Russia, etc. to wipe out all resistance there. Haftar is dual citizen, US/Libyan.
May Allah have mercy on all of us.
