From the UN Aid Coordination Office, OCHASpokesman Jens Laerke described chaotic scenes across Lebanon as people continued to flee airstrikes that have killed more than 1,000 people in the past two weeks alone, the UN human rights office said. OHCHR.
“We can expect further displacement,” Mr. Laerke told journalists in Geneva.
“We don’t have enough supplies, we don’t have enough capacity and that’s exactly why we’re launching this appeal, because we need this extra cash injection to actually procure it and the capacity to increase the response, which is not true it should be , because, as usual, we are running after the facts,” he continued.
“It’s easy to break things and hurt people, but… returning to some kind of normality takes a lot of time and costs a lot of money. That is why we must stop this development and de-escalate this conflict as quickly as possible.”
UN force ‘in position’
The UN interim force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) said that it had been informed on Monday of the Israeli army’s plans for “limited ground incursions”.
“Despite this dangerous development, peacekeepers remain in position,” the UN force said in a statement. “We regularly adjust our posture and activities, and we have contingency plans in place that we can activate if absolutely necessary. The safety and security of peacekeepers is of paramount importance, and all actors are reminded of their duty to respect it.”
UNIFIL has approximately 10,500 peacekeepers from 50 troop-contributing countries. According to its website, the mission carries out about 14,500 activities per month.
The UN mission emphasized this in a statement in response to the escalating emergency any Israeli border crossing into Lebanon would be “contrary to Lebanese sovereignty and territorial integrity, and a violation of Resolution 1701” published by the Security Council in 2006 aimed at stopping the war between Israel and Hezbollah.
“We urge all actors to refrain from such escalating acts, which will only lead to more violence and more bloodshed,” UNIFIL said.
Tinderbox from the Middle East
Echoing these concerns, the UN human rights office, OHCHR, warned that rising hostilities in the Middle East had the potential “to engulf the entire region in a humanitarian and human rights catastrophe.”
“Too many innocent children, women and men have been murdered and too much destruction has been caused,” she said.
In addition to the more than one million people displaced in Lebanon, repeated shelling of northern Israel by Hezbollah, which began in response to Israel’s war in Gaza, has uprooted about 60,000 people, said OHCHR spokesperson Liz Throssell.
“As armed violence between Israel and Hezbollah boils over, the consequences for civilians have already been dire we fear that a large-scale ground invasion by Israel in Lebanon would only lead to greater suffering.”
She added: “All parties to these conflicts must clearly distinguish between military targets and civilians in the way they conduct hostilities. They must do everything they can to protect the lives of civilians, their homes and the infrastructure essential to their daily existence, as clearly required by international humanitarian law.”
The Gaza crisis is as bad as ever
Meanwhile in Gaza, almost a year after war broke out following Hamas-led terror attacks in multiple locations in Israel, the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees, UNRWAdescribed the enormous needs among citizens.
“I can say on behalf of the people who speak to me that they feel forgotten, that their needs are not as important as those of others and that what they need is only basic things like food, water and shelter are completely overlooked. in such devastating circumstances,” said UNRWA spokesperson Louise Wateridge.
“We are now 12 months into this war and I can tell you that 1.9 million people have been displaced. It is reported that 41,000 people died. I can tell you that 63 percent of the buildings have been damaged or destroyed. But I cannot quantify the horrors that people have endured relentlessly for 12 months.”
From Amman, Ms Wateridge described how fear had been “instilled” in the “entire population, every hour of every day” after constant bombardment from land, sea and air.
Desperate doctors trying to save lives in hospitals worked amid the “overwhelming smell of blood…unable to save countless children,” the UNRWA spokesperson said, stressing that The situation in Gaza is now “as bad as ever”.
“Our demand has remained the same over the past 12 months of war: we need an immediate ceasefire, the return of hostages and safe and sustainable relief to give families the chance to rebuild their lives.”
