At least 28 dead in the explosion of a tanker truck in Lebanon in the middle of the fuel crisis

The column of smoke caused by the explosion in Tleil, in northern Lebanon, this Sunday.

At least 28 people have died and about 80 have been injured this Sunday when a tanker loaded with gasoline exploded in Altalil, north Lebanon, amid a fuel supply crisis that has paralyzed the country. Two hundred people were around the vehicle when the explosion occurred, after triggering a confrontation with firearms between those who wanted to refuel, according to security sources cited by Reuters. The Army had confiscated the tanker truck concealed by a group of speculators and was distributing the gasoline in the Akkar district.

The most severely burned cases will have to be evacuated out of Lebanon due to the collapse of the national health system. The American University hospital in Beirut, one of the largest in the country, warned in a statement that it faces an "imminent disaster" due to the threat of a forced closure starting Monday as a result of fuel shortages, reports Efe. “40 adults and 15 children can die immediately connected to respirators; 180 people undergoing hemodialysis will perish within a few days, and in the following weeks hundreds of cancer patients will lose their lives, ”the health center warned. For weeks now, the Lebanese electricity company has only provided a maximum of two hours a day of supply, while alternative suppliers, through private generators,daylight hours are rationed due to the shortage of diesel and the price of energy skyrockets.

The Levantine Mediterranean country is experiencing prolonged blackouts. Households face serious difficulties in preserving food in the midst of high temperatures. Chaos broke out on Saturday when the governor of the Central Bank, Riad Salame, stated that he was not going to reverse his decision to abolish subsidies for the purchase of fuel. Thousands of drivers lined up long lines with their vehicles at gas stations, while security forces seized tens of thousands of liters hoarded on the black market and forced owners to restart the pumps.

⚠️Major Incident⚠️: 22 teams from the #Lebanese_Red_Cross are responding to an explosion of a fuel tanker in #Akkar.

Our teams are working on transporting the wounded and the dead bodies to hospitals in the area.

pic.twitter.com/Yg0vVTTDBX

- Lebanese Red Cross (@RedCrossLebanon) August 15, 2021

One year after the disaster that devastated the port of Beirut, Lebanon remains in a political and economic coma.

The explosion of tons of ammonium nitrate, used for fertilizers and explosives, caused 218 deaths, injured some 7,000 people and displaced 300,000 Beirutis from their homes, with damages estimated at up to 5,000 million euros, in one of the largest non-nuclear explosions recorded in contemporary times.

The patronage regime of ethnic and religious parties that emerged three decades ago, after the bloody civil war that lashed the country for 15 years, has collapsed.

Four prime ministers have come to power in the last year without any of them having managed to form a stable government.

Lebanon remains paralyzed, while the international community refuses to revive its bankrupt economy if drastic anti-corruption reforms are not implemented.

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Former Prime Minister Saad Hariri, leader of the majority Sunni Muslim community in the north, has called for the resignation of Lebanon's president, Christian Michel Aoun.

Hariri proclaimed via Twitter that "the Akkar massacre is no different from the explosion in the port of Beirut."

With the foreign currency accounts in the bank subjected to a corralito; With hardly any basic medicines or food in pharmacies and supermarkets, and with the Lebanese pound devalued by 90% against the dollar and inflation that has exceeded 200% over the last two years, Lebanon is slipping into chaos. Half of its 4.5 million inhabitants and almost all the refugees - one million Syrians and hundreds of thousands of Palestinians - have fallen below the threshold of extreme poverty.