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SvennoJ 5 days ago
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‘This needs to stop’: UN

The UN has voiced deep worry “about the escalation in Lebanon”, where Israeli air raids today have killed at least 182 people.

“The attacks that we saw on the communication devices, the pagers, followed by rocket attacks and rocket fire being exchanged on both sides … marks a real escalation,” Ravina Shamdasani, spokeswoman for the UN rights office, told AFP.

“What we’ve been warning about all along, the regional spillover of the conflict, it appears that both the actions and the rhetoric of the parties to the conflict is taking the conflict to another level.”

After nearly a year of tit-for-tat cross-border fire between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, the strikes since the weekend are the most intense since the outbreak of Israel’s war on Gaza.

Shamdasani highlighted the calls from across the international community “pleading for a de-escalation”. “But instead of a de-escalation, what we have seen … is further rhetoric with further plans of an escalation,” she said.

“This needs to stop.”


A man watches rescuers sift through the rubble as they search for people still missing at the site of Friday’s Israeli strike in Beirut’s southern suburbs


Iran’s Pezeshkian says Israel seeking wider conflict

The Iranian president has spoken to journalists at the UN General Assembly in New York. “We know more than anyone else that if a larger war were to erupt in the Middle East, it will not benefit anyone throughout the world,” Masoud Pezeshkian said.

“It is Israel that seeks to create this wider conflict,” he added, insisting that Iran was not destabilising the region.

Death toll in Israeli strikes on Lebanon rises to 274

Lebanon’s health minister Firass Abiad says Israeli bombing has targeted medical centres, ambulances and cars of people trying to flee. According to the minister, at least 274 people have been killed, including 21 children, 39 women and two medics.


Civil defence teams extinguish fires in Lebanon’s south

The Lebanese Civil Defence has said its teams have been working to extinguish fires that broke out “in several homes, factories and warehouses in the southern governorates, Nabatieh and Bekaa” as a result of the Israeli attacks.

“The personnel also continue to treat the wounded, recover the bodies of those killed and transport them to hospitals to receive the necessary medical care,” it added in a statement.

Separately, the organisation said search-and-rescue operations and a comprehensive field survey are ongoing at the site of the building that collapsed” in an Israeli air raid on the southern suburbs of Beirut on Friday.

It added that the search for the missing has so far resulted in the recovery of the bodies of 54 people and 66 wounded. Five citizens remain missing.


Nurseries in Lebanon to close amid fighting: State media

Lebanon’s Health Ministry has announced the shutting down of all nurseries across the country, according to the National News Agency. Earlier, education authorities said that schools will be closed for two days in areas hit by Israeli strikes.

Firass Abiad says that the ministry is working to ensure those injured in Israeli strikes are getting the healthcare they need. The health minister said he has asked hospitals to stop taking regular, light cases to make space for the wounded from the south.

“We are working on directives for the first-aid centres to be turned into places that can receive the wounded,” he said. “The displaced people who have cancer, kidney failure and other chronic diseases, we have a plan to continue their treatment in different medical centres.”

UNIFIL urges diplomatic efforts to protect civilians in southern Lebanon

The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) has expressed “grave concern” for the wellbeing and safety of civilians residing in southern Lebanon.

“UNIFIL reiterates its strong call for a diplomatic solution and urges all parties to prioritize civilian lives and ensure they are not put in harm’s way,” it posted on X. The mission said it was vital to “fully recommit” to implementing UN Security Council Resolution 1701.

Under the resolution, adopted in 2006 to bring an end to the war between Israel and Hezbollah, UN peacekeepers were deployed to monitor a ceasefire along the 120km (75-mile) demarcation line, or Blue Line, between Israel and Lebanon.