“The Terres de l’Ebre are not the periphery, but the gravitational center of a people's dignity. On this National Day, we make the cry “I am here, we are here” our own and raise our voices against the cynicism of those who want us pacified and submissive,” proclaimed Núria Pinyes Font, philologist and firefighter, in the final manifesto of the pro-independence mobilization in Amposta. After traveling through the city's main arteries in two columns that moved in parallel, the march ended at six in the evening by the Ebro River, in front of the Hanging Bridge of the capital of Montsià, the great symbolic point of the mobilization. There were 13,000 people according to the organizers and 1,600 according to the police.The capital of Montsià has been one of the three cities this year where the independence movement has called upon protesters (along with Barcelona and Girona), with an explicit commitment to decentralizing the mobilization. The event has brought together citizens, political parties, and civic and social entities from Montsià, Baix Ebre, Terra Alta and Ribera d'Ebre, Camp de Tarragona, the south of the Lleida province, and the north of the Valencian Country. And this has been felt in the streets: jotas and sardanas, gralles and dolçaines, band music and castellers have all mingled there. And precisely with this desire to appeal to the territory and its issues, the final speech of the event served to review some of the old and new projects (some still in an embryonic phase) that, in the opinion of the Catalan National Assembly, represent an aggression against the southern regions of Catalonia. “The wounds left open by the Ascó nuclear power plant and the proximity of the one in Vandellòs; the polluting industry of Ercros in Flix; the water transfer from the Ebro to the Camp de Tarragona; the failed Castor natural gas storage facility; the landfills of Tivissa and Riba-roja d’Ebre; the disastrous agrarian policies that have motivated the progressive abandonment of the countryside by farmers,” read Pinyes. And he further added: “The artificial intelligence gigafactory planned for Móra la Nova; the Plater, the territorial sector plan that organizes the implementation of renewable energies, are a coordinated set of measures that reduce the Terres de l’Ebre to the simple function of water and energy providers. And with economic control becoming increasingly distant.” Thus, the organizers wanted to take advantage of the mobilization to channel the discontent over very concrete issues of the Catalan political framework: “Independence as a response to the problems of the present and as a project for the future.”At the end of the event, the Valencian singer-songwriter Esther Querol performed two songs from her latest album Tot comença which served to also claim the unity of the Catalan language across all territories of the linguistic domain. The mobilization culminated with a drum circle and two human pillars raised by the casteller groups from Tortosa and the Ebre Delta. "It is difficult for us to narrow down the exact number of people who have mobilized, but we have far exceeded the number of protesters from last year's territorial demonstration in Tortosa," explained Jaume Graupera, a member of the Catalan National Assembly in the Ebre region and organizer of the mobilization.

Three weeks after the torrential rains that devastated the Baix Ebre and Montsià regions, Lluís Baiges still vividly remembers his farm transformed into a mud pit, littered with plant debris, greenhouse plastic sheeting, and collapsed metal structures. "We need two weeks of continuous work and more than forty people to try to recover the quarry that the water didn't wash away," he explains. In the greenhouses of Cultidelta—the family business he co-manages with his brother, specializing in the cultivation of native Mediterranean plants and horticultural and vegetable production—the mud marks are still visible. "The water came in like a tide and flooded some 60,000 square meters of greenhouses to a height of 80 cm. A week later, there was still stagnant water and trays of seedlings floating," he adds. The current swept away a significant portion of the crops. Among the plants they've been able to salvage, very few are usable for sale. "Most have been damaged by the mud itself, and those that haven't rotted from the excess moisture," he laments. "We're still in the process of assessing the damage, which is difficult to quantify, but I think we can estimate losses of around half a million euros, if we take into account the additional costs of repairing the damage, the loss of product, and the temporary halt in sales," he says.

"Today, concern for agricultural lands is taking a backseat, because the evil is inside our homes," explains Elda Roda, a resident of Godall, a town that was a bustle of people carrying tools to remove mud from the ground, clean warehouses, remove furniture, and assess the ravine. But this doesn't stop those who make their living from agriculture from also being on alert. Most farmers in the area have been unable to access their farms to conduct a precise assessment of the damage, but they already sense that the rains have destroyed large areas.

HeBaix Ebre fire, which has already burned some 3,200 hectares of mostly forested land, remains active and maintains the lockdown of 18,000 people. Strong winds during Monday night, with sustained gusts of 90 kilometers per hour, complicated attempts to contain the fire, but throughout Tuesday, the flames were prevented from spreading further into the Els Ports Natural Park. With some optimism given an improved weather forecast, firefighters worked intensely last night to try to stabilize the fire, something that has not yet been achieved.

Deltebre Danza is the fruit of an unconscious mindset. We were younger, we had enthusiasm, and above all, we were crazy. Around 800 artists, almost 300 shows, 100,000 spectators, 2,500 dance students, and a hundred teachers. The citizens of Deltebre have finally embraced it," explains Tortosa dancer and choreographer Roberto Olivan, director of the festival.

The story of the new reference hospital in Terres de l'Ebre continues to accumulate chapters. In 2006, the Minister of Health, Marina Geli, announced the construction of a complex on the outskirts of Tortosa, a reference hospital for 180,000 people from Baix Ebre, Montsià, Terra Alta and Ribera d'Ebre. Three months later, the Generalitat stated this on an information board located on land in the Partial Plan of La Farinera, where the centre was planned. But almost twenty years later there is no hospital, nor land to build it. This Friday, the Generalitat has recognised that after delays and a thousand vicissitudes - economic crisis, budget cuts and a bureaucratic and technical labyrinth, old territorial and neighbourhood political grievances - the plots that the Tortosa City Council had acquired in the previous term to definitively house the new health complex are not valid due to their nature.