BEIRUT — A On the top of Lebanon’s 15-year civil warfare within the late Nineteen Eighties, Saleh Ali Sariyeh determined to depart the Palestinian refugee camp the place he had been dwelling and transfer to Libya seeking security and a greater future.
On Monday, the 62-year-old architect was killed alongside along with his spouse and two daughters in Libya’s coastal metropolis of Derna, when their dwelling was washed away by flooding that devastated the town. The floods killed greater than 5,000 individuals and 1000’s stay lacking days after the floods.
Mediterranean storm Daniel precipitated lethal flooding in lots of cities of japanese Libya, however the worst-hit was Derna. Because the storm pounded the coastal metropolis of about 90,000 on Sunday, residents mentioned they heard loud explosions when the dams exterior the town collapsed. Floodwaters washed down Wadi Derna, a river operating from the mountains by the town and into the ocean.
“We misplaced contact with them after the storm,” mentioned Sariyeh’s youthful brother Mohammed, talking by phone from the southern port metropolis of Sidon. The Sariyeh household had lived within the Palestinian refugee camp of Ein el-Hilweh close to Sidon the place intense combating just lately between members of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah group and militant Islamic factions left dozens of individuals {dead} or wounded.
Mohammed Sariyeh mentioned after they misplaced contact with the household in Derna, they began following the information by social media and a day later they had been in a position to contact individuals who lived close by. They gave them details about the tragedy that hit the town and killed the household.
Requested if their constructing was washed away, Mohammed Sariyeh mentioned “the entire neighborhood not solely the constructing. The lived near the valley and shut the dam.”
Derna lies on a slim coastal plain on the Mediterranean Sea beneath steep mountains operating alongside the coast. Solely two roads from the south stay usable, and so they contain an extended, winding route by the mountains.
Mohammed Sariyeh mentioned his brother left Lebanon within the late Nineteen Eighties and had been residing in Derna since then till his demise alongside along with his spouse, Sanaa Jammal, and their two daughters. The daughters, Walaa, 27, a pediatrician, and Hoda, 25, who labored in data expertise, had been each born and raised in Libya.
Since leaving Lebanon greater than three many years in the past, Sariyeh’s life was centered in Libya and he used to go to Lebanon as soon as each few years. Since Libya’s battle started in 2011, the household stayed even when Derna fell beneath the management of the Islamic State group in 2015, mentioned the sufferer’s nephew, additionally named Mohammed Sariyeh.
Sariyeh mentioned a mass funeral was held Monday and included the household of his brother. He added that persons are being laid to relaxation rapidly due to the big variety of victims and electrical energy cuts making it troublesome to maintain the our bodies.
“As soon as they determine the individuals they bury them. It’s a disaster-stricken space,” he mentioned.
Ossama Ali, a spokesman for the Ambulance and Emergency Heart in japanese Libya, mentioned at the least 5,100 deaths had been recorded in Derna, together with round 100 others elsewhere in japanese Libya. Greater than 7,000 individuals had been injured within the metropolis, most receiving therapy in discipline hospitals that authorities and help businesses arrange. About 30,000 had been displaced in Derna.
The variety of deaths is more likely to enhance since search and rescue groups are nonetheless gathering our bodies from the streets, buildings and the ocean, he mentioned.
The sufferer’s nephew mentioned that due to the continued combating in Ein el-Hilweh, the household in Lebanon won’t be receiving condolences within the camp. They plan to carry a gathering on Tuesday exterior the camp in Sidon to mourn the demise of their family members, he mentioned.