World

‘The hotel burned down’: Grandmother who thought she was going to die among angry tourists stranded in Rhodes

Published

2 years ago

July 23, 2023

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On the floor of Rhodes airport, the exhausted sleep.

People who fled their hotels as the flames approached.

Some running for their lives.

In one corner, we meet Corina, a tourist from Denmark, with her husband Peter and daughter Mathilde.

They lie in a little pile, salt stains covering their clothes.

Weather – latest: New evacuations on Corfu in at least 18 areas

Corina explains they had been staying in Kiotari, when they were told the wildfires were coming in their direction and it was time to leave.

For 11km (6.8 miles) they walked in scorching temperatures, but every time they thought they were safe, they were told the flames were near again.

In the end, their only option was to board a boat waiting off the shore and sail to the north of the island.

Now the adrenaline has worn off, the shock is beginning to sink in.

“I was afraid not to see my oldest child at home and my grandson again,” Corina says, beginning to cry.

“You thought you were going to die?” I ask.

“Yes, the fire was just behind us. It was awful,” she replies.

She adds: “We got evacuated yesterday at the hotel and were sent down to the beach. We walked 11km and again were sent to the beach where we didn’t know what to do.

“And then the military came and picked us up and we were taken further south.

“Later, the police boat came and another boat came, too, so we got evacuated.”

Even when they were on the water it was frightening, Corina said.

“The fire was moving along with us. The hotel had burned down.

“That is why we are sitting here in what we’ve got with us,” she said.

After getting on a boat at 2.30am, they did not arrive in Rhodes Town until 6am.

Relief, exhaustion, fear and anger as tourists sleep on floors

Her story is a common one as we make our way around the airport speaking to holidaymakers.

It’s an emotionally charged atmosphere; a mix of relief, exhaustion, fear at what may have been, and anger.

And as the hours tick by, anger is the feeling which is beginning to dominate.

Every tourist we spoke to was asking the same question: “Where is my holiday company?”

Most say while the residents of Rhodes have opened their homes and communities to support them, they feel the tour companies they paid thousands to are missing in action.

At most, they have sent local representatives armed with scant answers to face the music.

They’re the “sacrificial lambs”, one man from Birmingham told me.

So now hundreds sleep on the floors of schools, sports centres and the airport waiting for news.

While they are deeply frustrated, they are aware that ultimately, they are the lucky ones – they can leave.

The residents of Rhodes who have lost homes and businesses to these fires are the ones who will be left counting the cost of climate change.

World

Israel’s PM tries to get on front foot in propaganda war he knows he is losing

Published

6 hours ago

August 11, 2025

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Israel's PM tries to get on front foot in propaganda war he knows he is losing

Israel’s prime minister added more detail to his deeply controversial plans for military escalation in Gaza at a news conference with foreign media yesterday – despite the condemnation of the UN Security Council, which met in an emergency session and urged him to rethink.

Benjamin Netanyahu spoke of a “fairly short timetable” to establish designated “safe zones” for the one million or so set to be displaced from Gaza City.

He also vowed to seize and dismantle Hamas’s final strongholds there – in the central refugee camps, and in al Mawasi, along Gaza’s southwestern coast.

This, per Netanyahu, is the only way to destroy the terror group, which he claimed “subjugates Gazans, steals their food and shoots them when they try to move to safety”.

Al Mawasi is already home to a significant displaced population, most of whom live in tents cramped up against the Mediterranean Sea, in what is already a designated humanitarian zone.

If members of Hamas live among them, rooting them out will be hugely complicated and will involve significant civilian casualties. If the residents of Gaza City can’t evacuate south to al Mawasi, where will they go?

Netanyahu’s plan is to set up more aid distribution sites through the controversial Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) and to flood Gaza with food.

He claimed his policy was not one of forced starvation – describing particular photos of starving babies as “fake news”, and accusing the media of painting a false picture.

“The only ones who are being deliberately starved in Gaza are our hostages,” the prime minister claimed.

I asked Netanyahu how he would go about preventing the kinds of daily killings taking place at aid distribution points in the months since GHF has been operating.

Doctors Without Borders has described these incidents as deliberately orchestrated.

The prime minister said increasing the amount of aid heading into the Strip was the answer.

“And by the way, a lot of the firing was done by Hamas seeking to have a response by our forces,” he added. “And very often they didn’t, they held back. They stayed their own fire even though their own lives were on the line.”

This was Israel’s prime minister trying to get on the front foot in a propaganda war he acknowledged he was losing. He was loath to admit the presence of famine in Gaza.

It took two questions before he acknowledged there was “deprivation”, even if he would not be drawn on whether his 11-week total blockade of the strip earlier this year had played any role.

He recognises that the appalled response of the international community to the human cost of this war, and the accusations of war crimes and genocide which Israel so vehemently rejects, are a terrible look.

This was his attempt to reclaim the narrative.

World

Defiant Netanyahu sets out plan for military escalation in Gaza – and describes photographs of starving babies as ‘fake news’

Published

12 hours ago

August 10, 2025