A gay belly dancer turns grief into joy after fatal attack on Berlin's Pride festival

BERLIN (AP) — Haidar Darwish, a Syrian belly dancer and artist, took the stage at Berlin's Museum Island wearing a flamboyant hoop skirt and red fez. He asked the audience for a moment of silence and then said the show must go on — despite a fatal attack on the city's Pride celebrations that has plunged the LGBTQ+ community into mourning.

“Yesterday there was an attack and a hate crime on our community in Berlin during the Pride Parade," he told the crowd Sunday night, struggling to keep his emotions in check.

“It’s heavy on our community but we are pushing through, and we are here specifically today, myself and my artists, to show up and be visible," Darwish said.

Saturday night’s van ramming and stabbing near Berlin’s Pride festival that left one person dead and almost 30 wounded was an extremist terror attack, authorities said.

The suspect was killed by police Sunday evening. Authorities said Abdul Ballout, a 21-year-old German-born citizen with Lebanese roots, apparently ran toward officers with a sharp instrument and police fired at least one shot.

Some officials question how Ballout had been able to move freely in Germany following a conviction linked to his ties to the Islamic State group.

Darwish, who fled from Syria in 2016, was on stage Sunday with Queens Against Borders, a performance group created to build solidarity with refugees, migrants and immigrants from the LGBTQ+ community. Also on stage were an Egyptian belly dancer, Aleya, and a Nigerian drag performer, Countess Sasha Seduction.

Pushing aside the pain, Darwish began spinning like a traditional Anatolian dervish, his red skirt billowing in a graceful cone. Traditional Arabic melodies filled the space, growing louder and faster as Darwish stripped off his skirt and, to cheers, began performing belly dance moves.

“We’re trying our best, to be honest, in these weird, horrible times to create a stage where we can be present,” the 30-year-old Darwish, who goes by “The Darvish,” told The Associated Press.

He stressed that it was especially important for them to perform on the night after the attack for a wider audience outside their LGBTQ+ community that included Berliners of all backgrounds as well as many foreign tourists.

Nonetheless, he said that “we are tired to constantly be put in a position where we have to fight endlessly.”

He said the dancers could easily stay home but “we can also put grief into joy.”

Darwish and the other performers danced until the audience leaped from their chairs and joined in, transforming an otherwise sad and somber night.

Kekik a member of the Berlin-based LGBTQ collective Queens Against Borders, prepares backstage before an open-air show in Berlin, Germany, Friday, July 17, 2026. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)

Haidar Darwish, a Syrian belly dancer with the Berlin-based LGBTQ collective Queens Against Borders, performs during an open-air show in Berlin, Germany, Sunday, July 26, 2026. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)

Haidar Darwish, a Syrian belly dancer with the Berlin-based LGBTQ collective Queens Against Borders, prepares backstage before an open-air show in Berlin, Germany, Friday, July 17, 2026. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)

Haidar Darwish, a Syrian belly dancer with the Berlin-based LGBTQ collective Queens Against Borders, performs during an open-air show in Berlin, Germany, Sunday, July 26, 2026. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)

Haidar Darwish, a Syrian belly dancer with the Berlin-based LGBTQ collective Queens Against Borders, performs during an open-air show in Berlin, Germany, Friday, July 17, 2026. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)

PARIS (AP) — Heat waves and scant rainfall in Europe have contributed to historic wildfires in France and Spain that have forced hundreds of thousands of people to flee their homes in one of the continent's biggest evacuation efforts since World War II.

Rising temperatures later this week could complicate efforts to battle the blazes that have scorched an area four times the size of Paris in southwestern France and are raging near Spain's capital, Madrid.

Climate data shows Europe is heating faster than anywhere else on earth. The continent has already faced extreme heat events multiple times this year.

Firefighters in Spain have called the blazes so violent that they could not be tackled head on. But the first glimmer of hope emerged Monday in France that the spread of a giant fire in the southwestern Gironde region may have slowed.

Here's what to know.

Europe's above-average temperatures, with a prolonged heatwave in June, have contributed to drought conditions. Record-breaking temperatures in Western Europe compounded low rainfall levels as the extreme heat drew moisture from vegetation, creating abundant fuel that allows flames to spread faster and burn more intensely.

A study released in June by World Weather Attribution found that the record-breaking heat in recent weeks would not have been possible without climate change.

France's national meteorological service Météo-France said June was the hottest on record there, averaging 3.8 degrees Celsius (6.8 degrees Fahrenheit) above normal, while rainfall was nearly 50% below average.

Spain is used to forest fires in warmer months, but climate change has made its summers hotter and drier. That, combined with the decline in farming and industries that once used forest materials, has turned large swaths of wilderness into a tinderbox.

While estimates vary, national and European Union authorities are reporting fires of record scope this year. The EU’s European Forest Fire Information System estimates that over 300,000 hectares (3,000 square kilometers or 1,160 square miles) have burned in France and Spain.

France’s Interior Ministry says 13,566 fires have swept across over 116,000 hectares (1,160 square kilometers or 448 square miles) since January, the highest annual figure in the country’s modern records.

Spain’s Minister for the Ecological Transition, Sara Aagesen, said the 153,000 hectares (1,530 square kilometers or 591 square miles) burned this year is six times the amount that burned through the first half of 2025.

Contributing to this year's total was Spain's largest and third-largest fires ever, with a blaze in the rural terrain of Ávila west of Madrid burning over 50,000 hectares (500 square kilometers or 193 square miles), some five times the area of Barcelona. Earlier this month, 13 people died in a blaze in southeastern Almeria, Spain's deadliest fire in recent memory.

Over 300,000 people have been displaced from their homes in France and Spain in what the EU on Monday called “one of the biggest evacuation operations in Europe.”

More than 250,000 people have been evacuated in France, with 220,000 of them in the southwestern region of Gironde. With France about to enter its peak August tourist season, Gironde authorities took steps to keep vacationers away, banning holiday camps for children and for people with disabilities.

In Spain, 79,000 people have been evacuated from their homes in villages west of Madrid and in Castellón, a province on the eastern coast, while 30,000 others have been confined to their homes, the government said.

European Commissioner for crisis management Hadja Lahbib said Monday that the EU had sent seven planes and four helicopters from Czechia, Croatia, Germany, Portugal, Slovakia, Sweden and Turkey to France, and another six planes from Greece, Italy and Turkey to Spain.

“No country should ever have to face a disaster of this scale alone,” Lahbib said. “To the people of France and Spain: Europe will stand with you until the fires are out.”

The 27-nation bloc’s Copernicus satellite program is providing emergency authorities with up-to-date maps of fire risk.

Spike reported from Budapest, Hungary. Associated Press writers Joseph Wilson in Barcelona, Spain, and Sam McNeil in Brussels contributed.

A De Havilland Canada DHC-8-400 Dash 8 operated by the French civil defense agency drops fire retardant as wildfires rage near Marcheprime, outside Bordeaux, France, Monday, July 27, 2026. (AP Photo/Emma Da Silva)

Firefighters tackle a blaze as wildfires rage near Le Las, outside Bordeaux, France, Monday, July 27, 2026. (AP Photo/Emma Da Silva)

Firefighters battle a wildfire in San Martin de Valdeiglesias, west of Madrid, Spain, Sunday, July 26, 2026. (AP Photo/Manu Fernandez)