Submitted by YOUR NEW REALITY

Snowball Fights In Syria, Floods Carry Crocodiles Into African Towns

Blame climate change, global warming, worldwide media interest or James Bond-esque villains firing up their weather control systems, but there sure seems to be a lot of freakish weather events breaking out across the planet in these first few weeks of 2008 :

    Extreme or rare weather conditions played havoc with much of the world yesterday with snowball fights in the Holy Land, ravenous crocodiles terrorizing flood-stricken Africa and China’s worst winter storms in 50 years crippling the transport system.

    A rare snowstorm swept the Middle East, blanketing the Holy Land in white, shutting schools and sending excited children into the streets for snowball fights. The weather in Jerusalem topped local newscasts, eclipsing a government report on Israel’s 2006 war in Lebanon.

    Men in long Arab robes pelted each other with snowballs and children used inflatable tubes as sleds in the Jordanian capital, Amman. Snow blanketed the hills overlooking the Syrian capital of Damascus and covered most mountain villages and blocked roads in Lebanon. Many residents were surprised to see snow when they awoke. For some, it was their first time.

    “I am just astonished with the snow. When I saw the snow … I felt happy, my heart was laughing,” Mary Zabaro, 17, said in Ramallah.

    “The white snow is covering the old world and I feel like I am in a new world where everything is white, clean, and beautiful,” said Bothaina Smairi, 28.

    There was little of beauty in southern regions of Africa where floods and heavy rains have left about 70,000 people in Malawi homeless and destroyed farming communities along the Shire River valley. Zambia, Zimbabwe and Mozambique have also been hit by floods that have killed dozens and ruined lives.

    Amid the destruction, hungry crocodiles hunted the displaced, emergency officials said. Some 3,000 Mozambicans fled floods in their own country seeking refuge in Malawi.

    “They are coming in dug-out canoes from the Mozambican side of the Shire River and our reports indicate that crocodiles are just swimming all over attacking people,” emergency agency official Lillian Ngoma said.

More on the horrors of crocodile-infested floodwaters in southern Africa here :

    Crocodiles have killed five people forced to wade through floodwaters devastating Somalia, officials said on Sunday, as the interim government appealed for international help.

    Floods have killed scores, driven tens of thousands from their homes, submerged villages, and washed away bridges and roads in south-central Somalia, making it difficult to get aid to victims still trapped and stoking fears of epidemic disease.

    Residents in Bulo Burde town in the worst-hit central Hiraan region climbed trees to escape both the floodwaters and hungry crocodiles.

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