Israel fights locust swarms migrating from Egypt

Israel's agriculture ministry announced Wednesday that it was fighting off a locust swarms migrating from Egypt in the south with pesticides.

Ministry workers were battling the bugs since Wednesday's early morning, spraying them with pesticides from the air and at ground level as the plague is rapidly devastating harvests and causing massive economic losses for the local farmers.

According to ministry officials, Israel is currently working swiftly to stop the plague from reaching farms in the Ramat HaNegev region.

"We are trying to handle the situation as fast as we can, and we are using pesticides to prevent them from destroying crops," a ministry spokeswoman said.

"We are managing for now, but it depends on the wind and on the Egyptians also, because if Egypt handles the locust plague then we won't have more entering Israel. We are trying to handle this fast, because the locust eats absolutely everything that comes in their way," the spokeswoman added.

On Wednesday morning some local HaNegev farmers complained that a percentage of their crops had been damaged by the locusts.

The agriculture ministry has set up a hotline to give a hand and advice to farmers on how to deal with locust if their harvests are hit by the locusts.

Though the ministry believes that no more clusters of locusts will enter Israel, they are asking residents of the Western Negev area to watch out for any more swarms, as it is hard to predict whether the winds will bring more of this plague.