Sand, rain, snow, and high winds have created a very unusual weekend of weather in Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and Egypt. Several individual reports I’ve heard have stated that they’ve never seen anything like it. Snow has fallen in Jerusalem, Amman, and Damascus. Precipitation levels are as high as 8 inches (209 mm) in Upper Galilee and there’s nearly 8 feet (240 cm) of snow on the Mount Hermon ski slopes. Wind gusts were reported at up to 70 mph (120 kph). Israel’s ambulance services responded to 129 accidents on Sunday alone. Egypt and Syria each closed their largest ports and 28 buildings collapsed or partially collapsed in Alexandria, Egypt. Haaretz reports that an ancient port at Caesarea was destroyed. There were many injuries and at least 19 related deaths.
This AP story does the best job of covering the effects around the Middle East. The Jerusalem Post and Haaretz stories include photos.
2 thoughts on “Bizarre Weekend Weather in Middle East”
Make that 8 INCHES of snow (209 millimeters, not centimeters). Still, it was a doozy of a storm. In Jerusalem, I think the snow must have been on the western outskirts — did not see any here near the Old City. Mostly we had very high winds and terrible dust conditions; most of the rain tracked to the north of us, but finally caught up with us today, Monday.
TOM POWERS / Jerusalem
Tom – thanks for the correction. I have updated the numbers above. I trust that you're staying dry and toasty inside.