By Thomas Escritt

BERLIN (Reuters) -Chancellor Friedrich Merz's conservatives slipped into second place behind Germany's far right in a poll marking his hundredth day in office after a tough summer in which a botched judicial appointment and a reversal on supplying Israel with arms alienated foes and allies alike.

Nestled among shops in a bustling market in north Lebanon's Tripoli, Mohammed al-Shaar is at his workshop making traditional tarboosh hats, keeping up a family craft despite dwindling demand.

With a thimble on one finger, Shaar, 38, cuts, sews and carefully assembles the pieces of the conical, flat-topped felt hat also known as a fez, attaching a tassel to the top.

Reputedly the last tarboosh craftsman in Lebanon, the Tripoli native has been making the hats for 25 years in know-how passed on by his grandfather.

LONDON/BRUSSELS (Reuters) -The humanitarian crisis in Gaza has reached "unimaginable levels", Britain, Canada, Australia and several of their European allies said on Tuesday, calling on Israel to allow unrestricted aid into the war-torn Palestinian enclave.

"Famine is unfolding before our eyes. Urgent action is needed now to halt and reverse starvation," the foreign ministers of 24 countries said in a joint statement.

DUBAI (Reuters) -Iranian police arrested as many as 21,000 "suspects" during the country's 12-day war with Israel in June, a law enforcement spokesperson said on Tuesday, according to state media.

Following Israeli air strikes that began on June 13, Iranian security forces began a campaign of widespread arrests accompanied by an intensified street presence based around checkpoints and "public reports" whereby citizens were called upon to report on any individuals they thought were acting suspiciously.

By David Latona and Pietro Lombardi

MADRID/LISBON (Reuters) -Firefighters across Spain, Portugal, Greece, Turkey and the Balkans were battling wildfires on Tuesday with another heatwave pushing temperatures over 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) across parts of Europe.

Global warming is giving the Mediterranean region hotter, drier summers, scientists say, with wildfires surging each year and sometimes whipping up into "whirls".

"We are being cooked alive, this cannot continue," said a mayor in Portugal, Alexandre Favaios, as three fires burned.

The Council of Europe urged its member states on Tuesday to halt deliveries of weapons to Israel if they could be used for human rights violations.

Michael O'Flaherty, the Council's commissioner for human rights, said member states should do "their utmost to prevent and address violations of international human rights" in the conflict.

"This includes applying existing legal standards to ensure that arms transfers are not authorised where there is a risk that they may be used to commit human rights violations," he said, in a statement.

The Elders group of international stateswomen and statesmen for the first time on Tuesday called the situation in Gaza an "unfolding genocide", saying that Israel's obstruction of aid was causing a "famine".

"Today we express our shock and outrage at Israel's deliberate obstruction of the entry of life-saving humanitarian aid into Gaza," the non-governmental group of public figures, founded by former South Africa president Nelson Mandela in 2007, said in a statement after delegates visited border crossings in Egypt.

By Nidal al-Mughrabi

CAIRO (Reuters) -Israeli planes and tanks kept bombarding eastern areas of Gaza City overnight, killing at least 11 people, witnesses and medics said on Tuesday, with Hamas leader Khalil Al-Hayya due in Cairo for talks to revive a U.S.-backed ceasefire plan.

The latest round of indirect talks in Qatar ended in deadlock in late July with Israel and Palestinian militant group Hamas trading blame over the lack of progress on a U.S. proposal for a 60-day truce and hostage release deal.

CANAKKALE, Turkey (Reuters) -Firefighters battled multiple wildfires across Turkey on Tuesday, with a large blaze in the northwestern province of Canakkale burning for a second day after hundreds of residents were evacuated in precaution.

Both Canakkale airport and the Dardanelles Strait, which connects the Aegean Sea to the Sea of Marmara, were temporarily shut due to the wildfires on Monday.

GAZA (Reuters) -Student Maha Ali was determined to become a journalist one day and report on events in Gaza. Now she and other students have just one ambition: finding food as hunger ravages the Palestinian enclave.

As war rages, she is living among the ruins of Islamic University, a once-bustling educational institution, which like most others in Gaza, has become a shelter for displaced people.

"We have been saying for a long time that we want to live, we want to get educated, we want to travel. Now, we are saying we want to eat," honours student Ali, 26, said.