TUNIS: Migrants in Tunisia’s port city of Sfax who are aiming to make Europe their new home are now sharing the burden and the blame for escalating tensions deeply tinged with racism, amid the fears of European leaders who are trying to stanch the numbers of people arriving at their shores.
The antagonism that exploded in recent weeks in Sfax between Tunisians and mainly Black sub-Saharan migrants is widely seen as a turning point in how this North African nation deals with migration.

AMMAN: The UNHCR has warned of “serious consequences” for refugees in Jordan if no adequate funding is added to its shrinking budget.
The UN refugee agency has issued a recent appeal calling for “immediate” assistance after other agencies announced plans to reduce health services and food help in camps in Jordan.
Jordanian government-owned Al-Mamlakah TV commented on a UNHCR report which said that the UN refugee agency had only received 32 percent of its financial needs for 2023, or “$125.7 million of its annual budget of $390.11 million.”

GENEVA: Adolescent boys are systematically being separated from their mothers in detention camps in northeast Syria, a UN expert said Friday, warning the practice was causing irreparable harm and violated international law.
Fionnuala Ni Aolain said that during a visit to the Kurdish-controlled camps, she had noted “the separation of hundreds of adolescent boys from their mothers without any legal procedure.”
This appeared in particular to be happening to so-called third-country nationals, from countries other than Syria and Iraq.

BEIRUT: The death of a 6-year-old girl believed to have been the victim of a brutal rape has sparked outrage in Lebanon, with her grandfather accused of carrying out the attack.

It is alleged the victim, Lynn Taleb, suffered internal bleeding leading to her death eight days after she stayed with her mother at her grandfather’s house in Al-Minieh, north Lebanon.

North Lebanon Prosecutor Mathilda Touma filed a complaint against Taleb’s grandfather on suspicion that he raped his granddaughter, and against her mother for covering up the attack.

DIMONA, Israel: For two years, Toveet Israel and dozens of other residents of the Village of Peace have lived in fear.
Dimona, a city on the edge of the nation of Israel’s Negev Desert, has been her home for 24 years. Her eight children were born here and know no other country. Now, she and 130 other undocumented members of the African Hebrew Israelites of Jerusalem face deportation.
Receiving the order to leave two years ago was a “moment of disbelief” for Israel, 53. “I feel like the government has been merciless to me and my children,” she said.