Joshua trees are in peril. California has a plan to save them

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Joshua trees are in peril. California has a plan to save them

2024-11-30 03:52 Last Updated At：04:00

The California Department of Fish and Wildlife has released a new plan to protect the state's iconic Joshua trees, which are imperiled by wildfires, human development and climate change.

The 294-page draft plan includes calls for avoiding or minimizing direct and indirect impacts from overgrazing, pesticide use and unauthorized off-roading; relocating trees when projects require their removal or could harm them; and identifying and protecting lands where they could thrive in a future projected to be drier and hotter.

“In many ways, it's a good comprehensive plan of the things we need to do if the western Joshua tree is going to survive the very, very difficult decades ahead,” said Brendan Cummings, conservation director with the Center for Biological Diversity, a nonprofit that in 2019 petitioned to list the western Joshua tree as threatened under the state's Endangered Species Act.

The conservation plan is a requirement of the Western Joshua Tree Conservation Act that passed last year, making it the first law in the state to protect a species from the threats of climate change. The law also prohibits anyone from killing, damaging or removing a tree without a state permit.

The plan lists criteria and attributes to help identify land that should be prioritized for conservation, such as large areas with Joshua trees or areas with a high density of healthy and adult trees. It also suggests protecting regions where there is low risk of such threats as fires, invasive species and development, and where pollinators like moths or small mammal seed dispersers exist. It aims to identify these lands by December 2025 and permanently protect 70% of them by 2033.

The plan also calls on land managers and wildfire responders to create procedures to reduce and fight wildfires that threaten the species and their habitat, and develop measures to minimize impacts from rehabilitating burned areas. That includes protecting trees, replanting lost ones and other native species, and controlling invasives.

But as the proposed plan notes, its effectiveness and the survival of the trees will depend largely on whether humanity can limit and reduce the planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions from burning coal, oil and gas that are causing climate change.

Under a business-as-usual scenario, climate change could wipe out most, if not all, of the tree's habitat, Cummings said.

“Assuming we can keep to a mid-level emissions trajectory, we have a very good chance of saving the species if all the things outlined in this plan are carried out,” he said. “And primarily that’s doing what we can to protect as many of them as possible."

The draft plan will have to be approved by the California Fish and Game Commission.

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In a shock offensive, insurgents breach Syria's largest city for the first time since 2016

2024-11-30 03:53 Last Updated At：04:00

BEIRUT (AP) — Insurgents breached Syria’s largest city Friday and clashed with government forces for the first time since 2016, according to a war monitor and fighters, in a surprise attack that sent residents fleeing and added fresh uncertainty to a region reeling from multiple wars.

The advance on Aleppo followed a shock offensive launched by insurgents Wednesday, as thousands of fighters swept through villages and towns in Syria’s northwestern countryside. Residents fled neighborhoods on the city's edge because of missiles and gunfire, according to witnesses in Aleppo. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors the country's unresolved civil war, said dozens of fighters from both sides were killed.

The attack injected new violence into a region experiencing dual wars in Gaza and Lebanon involving Israel, and other conflicts, including the Syrian civil war that began in 2011.

Aleppo has not been attacked by opposition forces since they were ousted from eastern neighborhoods in 2016 following a grueling military campaign in which Syrian government forces were backed by Russia, Iran and its allied groups.

But this time, there was no sign of a significant pushback from government forces or their allies. Instead, reports emerged of government forces melting away in the face of advances, and insurgents posted messages on social media calling on troops to surrender.

Robert Ford, who was the last U.S. ambassador to Syria, said the attack showed that Syrian government forces are “extremely weak.” In some cases, he said, they appear to have “almost been routed.”

This week’s advances were among the largest in recent years by opposition factions, led by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group, or HTS, and represent the most intense fighting in northwestern Syria since 2020, when government forces seized areas previously controlled by the opposition.

The offensive came as Iran-linked groups, primarily Lebanon's Hezbollah, which has backed Syrian government forces since 2015, have been preoccupied with their own battles at home.

A ceasefire in Hezbollah's two-month war with Israel took effect Wednesday, the day the Syrian opposition factions announced their offensive. Israel has also escalated its attacks against Hezbollah and Iran-linked targets in Syria during the last 70 days.

Dareen Khalifa, a senior adviser with the International Crisis Group and an expert on Syrian groups, said the insurgents have signaled for a while that they were ready for an offensive. But no one expected the swift advance of the forces toward Aleppo.

“It’s not only that the Russians are distracted and bogged down in Ukraine, but also the Iranians are distracted and bogged down elsewhere. Hezbollah’s distracted and bogged down elsewhere, and the regime is absolutely cornered,” she said. “But the surprise element comes in with how quickly the regime crumbled.”

The attack on Aleppo followed weeks of simmering low-level violence, including government attacks on opposition-held areas. Turkey, which has backed Syrian opposition groups, failed in its diplomatic efforts to prevent the government attacks, which were seen as a violation of a 2019 agreement sponsored by Russia, Turkey and Iran to freeze the line of the conflict.

Turkish security officials said Thursday that Syrian opposition groups initially launched a long-planned “limited” offensive toward Aleppo, where attacks targeting civilians originated. However, the offensive expanded as Syrian government forces began retreating from their positions, the officials said.

The aim of the offensive was to reestablish the boundaries of the de-escalation zone, according to Turkish officials.

The 2016 battle for Aleppo was a turning point in the war between Syrian government forces and rebel fighters after 2011 protests against Bashar Assad’s rule turned into an all-out war.

Russia and Iran and its allied groups helped Syrian government forces reclaim control of the city that year after a grueling military campaign and a siege that lasted for weeks.

Besides backing opposition forces, Turkey has also established a military presence in Syria, sending troops into parts of the northwest. Separately and largely in the east of Syria, the United States has supported Syrian Kurdish forces fighting Islamic State militants.

The Syrian government did not comment on insurgents breaching Aleppo city limits.

The Kremlin said Friday that it considered the attack an encroachment on Syria’s sovereignty and that it supported the quickest possible establishment of constitutional order in the region.

“Of course, this is a violation of Syria’s sovereignty in this region,” Russian presidential spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told a press briefing.

Syria's armed forces said in a statement Friday that they clashed with insurgents in the countryside around Aleppo and Idlib, destroying drones and heavy weaponry. They vowed to repel the attack and accused the insurgents of spreading false information about their advances.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the insurgents detonated two car bombs Friday at the western edge of Aleppo. The war monitor said insurgents were also able to seize control of Saraqeb, south of Aleppo, a town at the strategic intersection of the highways linking Aleppo with Damascus and the coast. Syrian government authorities diverted traffic from that highway Thursday.

An insurgent commander posted a recorded message on social media calling on Aleppo residents to cooperate with the advancing forces.

Turkey's state-run Anadolu Agency reported that the insurgents entered the city center Friday and now control about 70 locations in Aleppo and Idlib provinces.

Syria’s state media reported that projectiles from insurgents landed in student accommodations at Aleppo's university in the city center, killing four people, including two students.

Syrian armed forces said the insurgents are violating a 2019 agreement that de-escalated fighting in the area, the last remaining opposition stronghold for years.

Hezbollah was “the main force” in the government’s control of Aleppo, said Rami Abdurrahman, head of the Observatory.

In a phone call with his Syrian counterpart, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi described the insurgent attacks in Syria “as a plot orchestrated by the U.S. and the Zionist regime following the regime’s defeat in Lebanon and Palestine.”

Insurgents posted videos online showing they were using drones, a new weapon for them. It was not clear to what extent the drones were used on the battleground.

Insurgents attacked a military airbase southeast of Aleppo with drones early Friday, destroying a helicopter, the Anadolu Agency reported. The opposition groups also seized heavy weapons and military vehicles belonging to the government forces, the agency said.

Associated Press writers Suzan Fraser in Ankara, Turkey, and Albert Aji in Damascus, Syria, contributed to this report.