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12 Tunisian Migrants Dead, 29 Others Rescued as Boat Sinks Off Tunisia

A Red Cross volunteer transfers two migrants to a tent to be attended after disembarking from a Spanish coast guard vessel, in the port of Arguineguin, on the island of Gran Canaria, Spain, April 4, 2024. REUTERS/Borja Suarez
A Red Cross volunteer transfers two migrants to a tent to be attended after disembarking from a Spanish coast guard vessel, in the port of Arguineguin, on the island of Gran Canaria, Spain, April 4, 2024. REUTERS/Borja Suarez
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12 Tunisian Migrants Dead, 29 Others Rescued as Boat Sinks Off Tunisia

A Red Cross volunteer transfers two migrants to a tent to be attended after disembarking from a Spanish coast guard vessel, in the port of Arguineguin, on the island of Gran Canaria, Spain, April 4, 2024. REUTERS/Borja Suarez
A Red Cross volunteer transfers two migrants to a tent to be attended after disembarking from a Spanish coast guard vessel, in the port of Arguineguin, on the island of Gran Canaria, Spain, April 4, 2024. REUTERS/Borja Suarez

At least 12 Tunisians were found dead and 29 others were rescued after a migrant boat capsized off the coast of the southeastern island of Djerba on Monday, a judicial official said, according to AFP.

“Twelve bodies were recovered and 29 people were rescued after their boat sank at dawn on Monday,” Medenine court spokesman Fethi Baccouche said, adding that five men and four women were among the dead, and that the cause of the sinking remained unknown.

Baccouche said the search for the missing, the number of whom was not specified, is still underway.

The boat set sail from the island of Djerba, he noted, adding that an investigation has been launched to determine the causes of death.

The Tunisian National Guard said it was alerted by four migrants who swam back ashore.

Most of the migrants were Tunisian nationals, accompanied by two foreign migrants.

Tunisia and neighboring Libya have become key departure points for migrants seeking better lives in Europe, often risking dangerous Mediterranean crossings.

Each year, tens of thousands of people attempt to make the crossing, with Italy — whose Lampedusa island is only 150 km away — often their first port of call.

Last Wednesday, Tunisian authorities announced that the bodies of 13 irregular migrants of African descent had been recovered off the coast of the city of Mahdia in the eastern part of the country.

More than 1,300 people died or disappeared last year in shipwrecks off Tunisia, according to the rights group Tunisian Forum for Economic and Social Rights.

Since January 1 until mid-May, at least 103 makeshift boats have capsized off Tunisia's coast, the country’s interior ministry said.

During the first four months of this year, the ministry said it saved and prevented 21,545 migrants from crossing the sea to Europe, an increase of approximately 22.5% year-on-year.

The International Organization for Migration has said more than 30,309 migrants have died in the Mediterranean in the past decade, including more than 3,000 last year.

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Israel’s Retaliatory Responses to Houthis Must Begin by Drawing Intelligence Plan

A person inspects damage at the site where a projectile fired from Yemen landed in Tel Aviv on December 21, 2024 (EPA)
A person inspects damage at the site where a projectile fired from Yemen landed in Tel Aviv on December 21, 2024 (EPA)
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Israel’s Retaliatory Responses to Houthis Must Begin by Drawing Intelligence Plan

A person inspects damage at the site where a projectile fired from Yemen landed in Tel Aviv on December 21, 2024 (EPA)
A person inspects damage at the site where a projectile fired from Yemen landed in Tel Aviv on December 21, 2024 (EPA)

Israel is considering options to respond to repeated attacks fired from Yemen in the past few days, the latest of which was a Houthi missile strike that injured more than a dozen people in Tel Aviv.
But military experts say Israel should first consider an intelligence plan for confronting the new front after it faced significant difficulties in both defending against and responding to the Houthi attacks.
On Saturday morning, Houthis launched a missile that triggered sirens throughout central Israel at 3:44 am. It was the second attack since Thursday.
Israel's military said the projectile landed in Tel Aviv's southern Jaffa area, adding that attempts to intercept a missile from Yemen failed.
“The incident is still being thoroughly investigated,” the army said, adding that following initial investigations by the Israeli Air Force and Home Front Command, “some of the conclusions have already been implemented, both regarding interception and early warning.”
Israeli military experts say the recent Houthi attacks have revealed serious security gaps in Israel's air defense systems.
“The pressing question now is why none of the other of Israel’s air defense layers managed to intercept the warhead,” wrote Yedioth Ahronoth's Ron Ben-Yishai. “The likely explanation is the late detection and the flat trajectory, which prevented the operation of all available defense apparatus.”
He said these incidents might expose a critical vulnerability in the army’s air defense system protecting Israel’s civilian and military home front.
According to Ben-Yishai, two main reasons might explain Saturday’s interception failure.
The first is that the missile was launched in a “flattened” ballistic trajectory, possibly from an unexpected direction.
As a result, Israeli defenses may not have identified it in time, leading to its late discovery and insufficient time for interceptors to operate.
He said the second, and more likely scenario is that Iran has developed a maneuverable warhead.
Such a warhead separates from the missile during the final third of its trajectory and maneuvers mid-flight—executing pre-programmed course changes—to hit its designated target, he wrote.
And while Israel has launched initial investigations into the failure of Israeli defense systems to intercept the missiles, it is now examining the nature, date and location of its response.
When Houthis launched their first missile attack on Israel last Thursday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned them, saying, “The Houthis will learn the hard way.”
But Israeli political analyst Avi Ashkenazi wrote in the Maariv newspaper that Israel should look at reality with open eyes and say out loud that it cannot deal with the Houthi threat from Yemen, and has failed to face them.
Last Thursday, 14 Israeli Air Force fighter jets, alongside refuelers and spy planes, flew some 2,000 kilometers and dropped over 60 munitions on Houthi “military targets” along Yemen’s western coast and near the capital Sanaa.
The targets included fuel and oil depots, two power stations, and eight tugboats used at the Houthi-controlled ports.
But the Maariv newspaper warned about the increasing involvement of Iran in supporting the Houthi forces.
“Iran has invested more in the Houthis in recent weeks following the collapse of the Shiite axis, making the Houthi movement a leader of this axis,” the newspaper noted.
Underscoring the failures of Israel’s air defense systems, Maariv said the “Arrow” missile defense system, Israel's main line of defense against ballistic missiles, had failed four times in a row to intercept missiles, including three launched from Yemen and one from Lebanon.
Yedioth Ahronoth's Ben-Yishai also warned that the threat posed by maneuvering warheads on Iran's heavy, long-range missiles would become existential for Israel should Iran succeed in developing nuclear warheads for these missiles.
Meanwhile, Israel’s Channel 12 said that in recent months, the Middle East has changed beyond recognition.
The channel said that for the first time in more than half a century, a direct and threat-free air corridor has been opened to Iran through the Middle East. Israel will benefit from this corridor to launch almost daily attacks on the border crossings between Syria and Lebanon, it said.
Channel 12 also reported that according to the Israeli military, the new threat-free corridor will help Israel launch a future attack on Iran's nuclear facilities.
“From Israel's perspective, the fall of the Assad regime and the collapse of the Iranian ring of fire are changing the balance of power in the Middle East,” the report added.