- A fuel tanker in Lebanon exploded, killing 20 people.
- The explosion occurred in the Acre region of the country.
- Many bodies were severely burned.
The Red Cross and state media said on Sunday that a tanker truck exploded in the Akha region of northern Lebanon, killing at least 20 people and injuring nearly 80 others.
This tragedy brought new suffering to a country already suffering from economic crises and severe fuel shortages, which paralyzed hospitals and caused long-term power outages.
The Lebanese Red Cross said on Twitter: “Our team has transported 20 bodies from the #AKKAR tanker explosion to hospitals in the area.”
Read | Lebanese government resigns amid anger over Beirut bombing
It added that 79 people were injured.
The official national news agency said a fuel container confiscated by the army exploded.
Melee
It said the explosion occurred overnight in a scuffle among “residents who gathered around the container to fill up with gasoline.”
The agency added that the army left the area before the battle and explosion.
Yassine Metlej, an employee at Akha Hospital, said that the facility received at least seven bodies and dozens of burn victims.
“The body was charred, and we couldn’t identify it,” he said.
“Some people lose face, some lose arms.”
He said that the hospital had to shut out most of the wounded because it could not treat severe burns.
Videos on social media purportedly from the explosion showed that metal scrap was consumed by a fire.
Agence France-Presse was unable to independently verify the authenticity of the video.
An employee from another hospital who requested only Mohammed said that more than 30 wounded have arrived at the facility.
“They all have burns,” he said, adding that many people were turned away because the hospital was unable to treat such cases.
Others found care 25 kilometers away at Al-Salam Hospital in the northern city of Tripoli, which is the only facility in the area that can handle burn patients.
Lebanon suffered what the World Bank called one of the worst financial crises on the planet since the 1850s, and it has been struggling to cope with increasing poverty, currency collapse and severe fuel shortages.
The Lebanese Army said on Saturday that it had seized thousands of liters of gasoline and diesel, which were stored by distributors at gas stations across the country.
Fuel shortages have left many people with only two hours of electricity a day, and several hospitals have recently warned that they may have to shut down due to power outages.
The Akha bombing occurred less than two weeks after the first anniversary of the bombing in Beirut Port in Lebanon last year, which killed more than 200 people.
On August 4, 2020, random storage of ammonium nitrate fertilizer stocks exploded, and a large area of the capital looked like a war zone.
This is one of the largest non-nuclear explosions in history.
In the year since then, no officials have been held accountable for the explosion.
Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri (Saad Hariri) shared a statement on Twitter linking Akha to the Beirut bombings.
“The Akha massacre is no different from the port massacre,” he said.
“If this is a country that respects the people, its officials will resign, from the president to the last person responsible for such negligence.”
Despite the economic crisis, political controversy delayed the formation of a new government after the last cabinet resigned after the port bombing.
International donors have pledged hundreds of millions of dollars in humanitarian aid to Lebanon.
But the conditions for this funding are the formation of a new government ready to take the lead in reforms and the resumption of negotiations with the International Monetary Fund.
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