Lebanon

A UN peacekeeper has been killed and three others injured after a UNIFIL patrol came under fire in southern Lebanon, the mission said on Saturday. The incident occurred on Saturday morning local time as blue helmets were clearing explosive ordnance along a road in the village of Ghanduriyah to re-establish links with isolated UN positions.

United States President Donald Trump has announced that the leaders of Israel and Lebanon will speak to each other for the first time in 34 years on Thursday. The announcement, made on Trump’s Truth Social account on Wednesday, came a day after Israeli and Lebanese ambassadors held their first direct diplomatic talks in more than three decades in Washington, DC, with Lebanon seeking to end Israel’s devastating attacks on the country.

Israeli strikes on Lebanon on Wednesday killed 182 people and wounded 890, according to an initial toll from authorities, with the capital, Beirut, hit by the most violent bombardment since the start of the war between Israel and Hezbollah. Israel announced Wednesday it did not consider Lebanon covered by the Iran-US truce announced overnight.

The UN’s top humanitarian official warned the Security Council on Tuesday that Lebanon is facing one of its most dangerous moments in years, with escalating violence, mass displacement and deepening human suffering pushing the country to “breaking point”.

The United Nations has condemned two consecutive days of deadly attacks on peacekeepers serving with the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), amid rising hostilities between Israeli forces and Hezbollah militants. Two Indonesian peacekeepers were killed on Monday, and two more were injured, in an explosion that hit a UNIFIL logistics convoy, destroying their vehicle.

The UN Secretary-General on Saturday called on the international community to intensify support for the Government and people of Lebanon, warning that the south of the country “risks being turned into a wasteland.”

UN experts* today raised the alarm over a rapidly escalating displacement crisis in Lebanon, after intense Israeli airstrikes and evacuation warnings in southern Lebanon and parts of Beirut. … The experts said there were reports of more than 700,000 people displaced across Lebanon since the attacks began in early March, of which 200,000 are children. 

Israeli warplanes bombarded Beirut’s southern suburbs and southern Lebanon after Hezbollah launched drones and rockets at northern Israel on Wednesday night in a sharp escalation of the 10-day conflict. … Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said later that they had carried out some strikes with Hezbollah.

In light of the escalating situation in the Middle East and the evolving humanitarian situation in Lebanon, the EU has mobilised emergency humanitarian aid consisting of food and medical kits, shelter materials, recreation kits and winter clothing kits, to meet the urgent, rising humanitarian needs in Lebanon.

Lebanon's president has called for direct negotiations with Israel as part of a proposal to end the escalating conflict with Hezbollah, while sharply criticising the Iran-backed group for dragging the country into a wider regional war.