Airstrikes in Lebanon have violated humanitarian law, says the UN refugee chief – National Achi-News

The UN refugee chief, Filippo Grandi, said on Sunday that airstrikes in Lebanon violated international humanitarian law by hitting civilian infrastructure and killing civilians, in relation to Israel’s bombardment of the country.

“Unfortunately, there are many violations of international humanitarian law in the way the airstrikes are conducted which have destroyed or damaged civilian infrastructure, killed civilians, affected humanitarian operations,” he told the media in Beirut.

Grandi was in Lebanon as it struggles to cope with the displacement of more than 1.2 million people as a result of an expanded Israeli air and ground campaign it says is targeting Iran-backed Hezbollah.

Fighting had previously been largely confined to the Israel-Lebanon border area, alongside Israel’s war in Gaza against the Palestinian group Hamas.

Grandi said that all parties to the conflict and those who have influence on them should “stop this carnage that is happening in Gaza and in Lebanon today.”

More than 2,000 people have been killed and nearly 10,000 wounded in Lebanon in nearly a year of fighting, most in the past two weeks, Lebanon’s health ministry said. Israel says around 50 civilians and soldiers have been killed.

Israel says it is targeting military capabilities and is taking steps to mitigate the risk of harm to civilians, while Lebanese authorities say civilians have been targeted.

Israel accuses Hezbollah and Hamas of hiding among civilians, which they deny.

Grandi said the World Health Organization had briefed him “about the egregious violations of IHL in terms of health facilities in particular that were affected in various locations in Lebanon,” using an acronym for international humanitarian law.

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Attacks on civilian homes can also be crimes, although the matter needs further assessment, he said.

The fighting has led to about 220,000 people crossing Lebanon’s border with Syria, 70 percent of whom are Syrian and 30 percent Lebanese, Grandi said, adding that these were conservative estimates.

Israel’s shelling of the main bridge that crosses the border with Syria in Masnaa on Friday was a “huge obstacle,” for those flows of people to continue, he said.

Many of the Syrians who left Lebanon had sought asylum and fled war and security conflicts after the start of the Syrian civil war in 2011.

Now was an opportunity for the Syrian government to show that “the safety and ability of returnees to go back to their homes or wherever they need to go is respected,” Grandi said.