Hezbollah’s Priority Is Defeating Israel, Open to Efforts to Stop the Attacks, Group’s Official

Smoke billows from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted the southern Lebanese village of Jbaa on October 11, 2024. (AFP)
Smoke billows from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted the southern Lebanese village of Jbaa on October 11, 2024. (AFP)
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Hezbollah’s Priority Is Defeating Israel, Open to Efforts to Stop the Attacks, Group’s Official

Smoke billows from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted the southern Lebanese village of Jbaa on October 11, 2024. (AFP)
Smoke billows from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted the southern Lebanese village of Jbaa on October 11, 2024. (AFP)

Hezbollah's priority right now is defeating Israel militarily, but it is open to any efforts to stop "the aggression", the head of Lebanese group's media office, Mohammad Afif, said on Friday.

The conflict between Israel and Hezbollah has intensified in recent weeks, with Israel bombing southern Lebanon, Beirut's southern suburbs and the Bekaa Valley, killing many of Hezbollah's top leaders, and sending ground troops into areas of southern Lebanon.

Hezbollah for its part has fired rockets deeper into Israel.

"Tel Aviv is only the start, Israel has only seen so little," Afif said in a televised press conference in the southern suburbs of Beirut with the rubble of destroyed buildings behind him.

"Our absolute priority now is to defeat the enemy and force them to stop the aggression. However, any internal or external political effort to achieve a cessation of aggression is appreciated as long as it is consistent with our comprehensive vision of the battle, its circumstances and its results."

He denied there were weapons stored in Beirut's southern suburbs and said Israel used timed bombs to make it seem so, promising residents of the neighborhood and those displaced from southern Lebanon and Bekaa that they would return soon.



UN Official: Lebanon Displacement 'Devastating', Support Insufficient

Displaced people sit in a makeshift tent set up on Beirut's seaside promenade - AFP
Displaced people sit in a makeshift tent set up on Beirut's seaside promenade - AFP
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UN Official: Lebanon Displacement 'Devastating', Support Insufficient

Displaced people sit in a makeshift tent set up on Beirut's seaside promenade - AFP
Displaced people sit in a makeshift tent set up on Beirut's seaside promenade - AFP

The displacement of hundreds of thousands of people in Lebanon is "devastating", a UN migration official has said, warning international support was falling short of the needs, amid intense Israeli bombing.

After a year of cross-border fire between Israel and Hezbollah, which launched attacks on Israel in support of its ally Hamas in Gaza, Israel last month escalated attacks in Lebanon's south, east and south Beirut.

The war has killed hundreds of people in Lebanon and displaced more than one million others, most of them since September 23, according to Lebanese authorities.

"With this wave of displacement, we see huge needs... the situation is devastating," said Othman Belbeisi, the International Organization for Migration's Middle East and North Africa director.

"Lebanon needs more support. What has been offered so far is minimal and does not match the needs," he told AFP on Thursday during a visit to Beirut.

The IOM has "verified and tracked" some 690,000 internally displaced people in Lebanon, Belbeisi said, noting about 400,000 others had reportedly fled the country, many of them for neighbouring Syria.

Around a quarter of the displaced in Lebanon, or more than 185,00 people, are in official shelters such as schools, according to the IOM.

Around another a quarter have rented accommodation, while some 47 percent are living in "host settings", the IOM said.

- Aid appeal -

Many people are staying with relatives, while some with nowhere to go are sleeping on the streets.

"It's really sad to see this (displacement) again in Lebanon," Belbeisi said, in a country that endured a 1975-90 civil war and a monthlong conflict between Israel and Hezbollah in 2006.

People have fled their homes "with nothing, out of fear, and now they have to rebuild everything once again", he added, as smoke rose from Israeli airstrikes in the city's southern suburbs.

The UN has appealed for $426 million to address the humanitarian crisis in the country over the next three months, including $32 million for the IOM to assist some 400,000 people, Belbeisi said.

UN humanitarian agency OCHA said Friday the appeal was just 12 percent funded, with $51 million received.

Lebanon has been enduring a five-year economic crisis that has impoverished many and crippled government services.

"We hope that everybody will be able to scale up their capacity," Belbeisi said.

"We want this (displacement) to end as soon as possible," he added.