China to Provide Emergency Medical Supplies to Lebanon

 Smoke billows over Beirut southern suburbs after a strike, amid the ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, as seen from Sin El Fil, Lebanon October 7, 2024. (Reuters)
Smoke billows over Beirut southern suburbs after a strike, amid the ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, as seen from Sin El Fil, Lebanon October 7, 2024. (Reuters)
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China to Provide Emergency Medical Supplies to Lebanon

 Smoke billows over Beirut southern suburbs after a strike, amid the ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, as seen from Sin El Fil, Lebanon October 7, 2024. (Reuters)
Smoke billows over Beirut southern suburbs after a strike, amid the ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, as seen from Sin El Fil, Lebanon October 7, 2024. (Reuters)

China will provide emergency medical supplies to Lebanon, China's official foreign aid agency, the China International Development Cooperation Agency, said on Tuesday, as Israel-Hezbollah fighting intensified.

Li Ming, spokesperson for the agency, said in a statement that as the fighting escalated recently, explosions and air strikes "have occurred in many places in Lebanon, causing a large number of casualties."

"At the request of the Lebanese government, the Chinese government has decided to provide emergency humanitarian medical supplies to Lebanon to help Lebanon carry out medical assistance," the statement said.

Hezbollah fired rockets at Israel's third-largest city, Haifa, and Israel looked poised to expand its offensive into Lebanon on Monday, one year after the devastating Hamas attack on Israel that sparked the Gaza war.

The focus of the war has increasingly shifted north to Lebanon where Israeli forces have been exchanging fire with Hezbollah since the Iranian-backed group launched a barrage of missiles in support of Hamas on Oct. 8.



UN Officials in Lebanon Call for Talks on Anniversary of Israel-Hezbollah Fighting

Smoke rises from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted the southern Lebanese village of Khiam on October 8, 2024. (AFP)
Smoke rises from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted the southern Lebanese village of Khiam on October 8, 2024. (AFP)
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UN Officials in Lebanon Call for Talks on Anniversary of Israel-Hezbollah Fighting

Smoke rises from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted the southern Lebanese village of Khiam on October 8, 2024. (AFP)
Smoke rises from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted the southern Lebanese village of Khiam on October 8, 2024. (AFP)

The UN special coordinator for Lebanon and the head of the peacekeeping force deployed along the border with Israel said that a negotiated solution is the only way to restore stability and the time to act is now.

The statement by Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert and Lt. Gen. Aroldo Lázaro of the UN Interim Forces in Lebanon (UNIFIL) came on the first anniversary of Lebanon’s Hezbollah group starting attacks on Israeli military posts along the border in support of its Hamas allies in the Gaza Strip.

Over the past weeks, the exchanges along the border have expanded into Israeli airstrikes and Hezbollah missile attacks that are hitting deeper inside both countries. In Lebanon, more than 1 million people have been displaced and over 1,300 killed since mid-September.

Plasschaert and Lázaro said Hezbollah’s attacks starting on Oct. 8, 2023 were in violation of UN Security Council resolution 1701 that ended the 34-day Israel-Hezbollah war in 2006.

“Too many lives have been lost, uprooted, and devastated, while civilians on both sides of the Blue Line are left wanting for security and stability,” the statement said referring to the border line along the Lebanon-Israel border.

“Today, one year later, the near-daily exchanges of fire have escalated into a relentless military campaign whose humanitarian impact is nothing short of catastrophic,” the statement said.

It warned that further that further violence and destruction will neither solve the underlying issues nor make anyone safer in the long run.

“A negotiated solution is the only pathway to restore the security and stability that civilians on both sides so desperately want and deserve,” the statement said. “The time to act accordingly is now.”