Malawi, Iran, Israel.

Today's three stories you should know.

Mar 13, 2023

Malawi

At least 60 people have been killed in Malawi, and six in Mozambique, as Cyclone Freddy deluged southern Africa for the second time in a month. The storm ripped roofs from buildings, fell trees, unleashed flooding and caused landslides as it pummelled both countries. Rescue teams are searching for survivors in at least three affected districts in Malawi, while the full extent of the damage and loss of life in Mozambique is not yet known because power supplies and phone signals were cut off in several affected areas. Freddy is one of the strongest cyclones ever recorded in the Southern Hemisphere, according to the World Meteorological Organization.

Iran

Iranian authorities said today that the country’s supreme leader had pardoned 22,000 people who took part in anti-government protests that captured global attention when they began last September. The huge number of people detained offers a glimpse into the scale of the crackdown on the protests. The demonstrations were sparked by the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, an Iranian Kurdish woman allegedly arrested for wearing her hijab too loosely, in the custody of the country's morality police. The protests, which involved Iranians from all walks of life, have been seen by some experts as the biggest threat to the Islamic Republic since the 1979 revolution.

Israel

Israel’s education minister has apologized to a group of Ethiopian Israeli schoolgirls who spotted their teachers exchanging racist messages about them while on a school trip. One of the girls filmed over a teacher’s shoulder as she messaged colleagues in a WhatsApp group with the name “Black School Trip.” The girl who filmed the phone in the teacher’s hand uploaded the video to social media and wrote: “It saddens me as a member of the [Ethiopian] community to see the level you sank to today. Instead of being our teachers and setting an example and making us feel like we're in our safest place, you did the exact opposite.” There are about 150,000 Ethiopian Jews in Israel and they are often discriminated against. The teachers have been suspended.