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Fin Whale Washes Up Dead on Israel Beach

People stand near the body of a dead fin whale in Israel. Reuters/Amir Cohen
People stand near the body of a dead fin whale in Israel. Reuters/Amir Cohen
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Fin Whale Washes Up Dead on Israel Beach

People stand near the body of a dead fin whale in Israel. Reuters/Amir Cohen
People stand near the body of a dead fin whale in Israel. Reuters/Amir Cohen

Israeli officials are investigating the cause of death of a fin whale that was found washed up on a beach in southern Israel.

The 17-meter-long whale was found on Thursday on the beach in the Nitzanim nature reserve, south of Tel Aviv on the Mediterranean coast.

The whale's body is "quite rotten, so it's impossible to say for certain the cause of death ... samples will be taken for research," said David Halfon, of the Israel Nature and Parks Authority.

The Authority’s CEO Shaul Goldstein said a “tar pollution” incident was plaguing area waters in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. He called for an investigation and prosecution of those responsible for the pollution.

A similar whale washed up dead in the area in 2016.

With rainy weather giving way to periodic sunshine on Friday afternoon, some Israelis walked down to the nature reserve's coastline to see the whale up close and take photos with it.

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Schools Shut on Greek Islands after Heavy Rainstorms Flood Roads

Stranded vehicles are seen in flood water in Naoussa, in the island of Paros, Greece March 31, 2025 in this screen grab from social media video. (Lorene Junillon/via Reuters)
Stranded vehicles are seen in flood water in Naoussa, in the island of Paros, Greece March 31, 2025 in this screen grab from social media video. (Lorene Junillon/via Reuters)
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Schools Shut on Greek Islands after Heavy Rainstorms Flood Roads

Stranded vehicles are seen in flood water in Naoussa, in the island of Paros, Greece March 31, 2025 in this screen grab from social media video. (Lorene Junillon/via Reuters)
Stranded vehicles are seen in flood water in Naoussa, in the island of Paros, Greece March 31, 2025 in this screen grab from social media video. (Lorene Junillon/via Reuters)

Schools and kindergartens were closed on several Greek islands including Paros and Mykonos on Tuesday after severe weather brought torrential rain, flooding and hailstorms to the Aegean Sea.

Authorities in Paros were struggling to remove vehicles stranded by the muddy waters after torrential rain swept through the island, a popular tourist spot in the summer, late on Monday.

"Roads have been damaged and we need help with more machines so that we can clear the streets," Paros' mayor Costas Bizas told public broadcaster ERT. "All this catastrophe happened in two hours."

The severe weather continued until the early hours of the morning, blanketing grasslands in nearby Mykonos with white balls of ice and prompting civil protection authorities to order the closure of schools there and on other islands, including Syros, Symi, Kalymnos and Kos.

Greece has been ravaged by floods frequently in recent years, with scientists attributing the extreme weather to warming waters amid rising global temperatures.

A devastating rainstorm, the worst to hit Greece in nearly a century, killed 17 people and caused extensive damage across the central agricultural region of Thessaly in 2023.