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Death Toll from Migrant Shipwrecks Off Tunisia Rises

Members of Italian Guardia Costiera prepare to bring on board the migrants of a wooden boat near the island of Lampedusa, in the Mediterranean Sea, September 1, 2021. REUTERS/Juan Medina
Members of Italian Guardia Costiera prepare to bring on board the migrants of a wooden boat near the island of Lampedusa, in the Mediterranean Sea, September 1, 2021. REUTERS/Juan Medina
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Death Toll from Migrant Shipwrecks Off Tunisia Rises

Members of Italian Guardia Costiera prepare to bring on board the migrants of a wooden boat near the island of Lampedusa, in the Mediterranean Sea, September 1, 2021. REUTERS/Juan Medina
Members of Italian Guardia Costiera prepare to bring on board the migrants of a wooden boat near the island of Lampedusa, in the Mediterranean Sea, September 1, 2021. REUTERS/Juan Medina

The death toll from several migrant shipwrecks off the Tunisian coast has risen to 17 people, a judicial official said on Sunday.

On Saturday the Tunisian coast guard said four boats carrying 120 African migrants headed for Italy had sunk off the coast near the city of Sfax, Reuters reported.

Another 5 bodies were recovered on Sunday, adding to 12 found by the coast guard overnight, said Mourad Turki, spokesperson for Sfax Courts. The coast guard said 98 people had been rescued.

The coastline of Sfax has become a major departure point for people fleeing conflict and poverty in Africa and the Middle East and seeking a better life in Europe.

In recent months, dozens of people have drowned off the Tunisian coast, with an increase in the frequency of attempted crossings from Tunisia and Libya towards Italy.

Hundreds of thousands of people have made the perilous Mediterranean crossing in recent years.

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UN, Aid Group Slam Israel’s Gaza Blockade after Report Warns of Famine Risk

This picture taken from a position in southern Israel along the border with the Gaza Strip on May 6, 2025, shows smoke billowing from explosions in Gaza. (AFP)
This picture taken from a position in southern Israel along the border with the Gaza Strip on May 6, 2025, shows smoke billowing from explosions in Gaza. (AFP)
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UN, Aid Group Slam Israel’s Gaza Blockade after Report Warns of Famine Risk

This picture taken from a position in southern Israel along the border with the Gaza Strip on May 6, 2025, shows smoke billowing from explosions in Gaza. (AFP)
This picture taken from a position in southern Israel along the border with the Gaza Strip on May 6, 2025, shows smoke billowing from explosions in Gaza. (AFP)

A senior United Nations official said Monday’s hunger report in Gaza is “extremely concerning” given that the strip’s roughly 2 million population continues to face “a very critical risk of famine.”

Beth Bechdol, deputy director of the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization, said Gaza’s food system has collapsed since Israel reimposed its blockade.

“We are moving into a period where the entire population of the Gaza Strip ... are continuing to face a very critical risk of famine and extreme hunger and malnutrition,” she said in an interview.

Mahmoud Alsaqqa, food security coordinator for the charity Oxfam, meanwhile, slammed Israel’s blockade, saying that thousands of aid trucks carrying aid were prevented from reaching desperate civilians.

“Gaza’s starvation is not incidental—it is deliberate, entirely engineered,” he said. “It is unconscionable and is being allowed to happen.”

Integrated Food Security Phase Classification, a leading international authority on the severity of hunger crises, said outright famine is the most likely scenario unless conditions change.

Nearly half a million Palestinians are in “catastrophic” levels of hunger, meaning they face possible starvation, the report said, while another million are at “emergency” levels of hunger.