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Lebanon Expresses Solidarity, Orders Probe into Threats against Saudi Embassy

File Photo: The Saudi foreign ministry said the Kingdom made the decision after the “calls and appeals of the moderate national political forces in Lebanon”
File Photo: The Saudi foreign ministry said the Kingdom made the decision after the “calls and appeals of the moderate national political forces in Lebanon”
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Lebanon Expresses Solidarity, Orders Probe into Threats against Saudi Embassy

File Photo: The Saudi foreign ministry said the Kingdom made the decision after the “calls and appeals of the moderate national political forces in Lebanon”
File Photo: The Saudi foreign ministry said the Kingdom made the decision after the “calls and appeals of the moderate national political forces in Lebanon”

Lebanon’s caretaker Interior Minister Bassam Mawlawi asked the security authorities on Thursday to run investigations into audio terror threats launched against the Saudi Embassy in Beirut.

An audio recording of a reported Saudi national threatening the Saudi Embassy in Beirut with terror acts against it has spread lately.

The video triggered a wave of wide condemnation in Lebanon.

Saudi Ambassador to Lebanon Walid al-Bukhari said in a tweet: “Terror is the offspring of extremism. Its seeds begin in a depressed mind.”

Lebanon’s Interior Ministry said in a statement that Mawlawi has asked the directorates of the Internal Security Forces and the General Security to open investigations into the incident.

“Out of keenness for Lebanon’s interest, safety and maintaining the best relations with the brethren countries mainly Saudi Arabia, Minister Mawlawi has sent letters to the Internal Security Forces and General Security to open investigations into the incident,” said the statement.

According to the statement, the perpetrator is a Saudi national who is wanted on numerous terror counts by Saudi authorities.

Lebanese Forces MP Melhem Riachi described in a tweet the recording as a “blatant assault” that harms Lebanon’s “brotherly” ties with Saudi Arabia.

Kataeb MP Elias Hankash said the threat will not intimidate the Saudi embassy or the ambassador. “Ambassador Bukhari is staying here. We count on the security apparatus,” he said in a tweet.

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UN Refugee Chief Says Airstrikes in Lebanon Have Violated Humanitarian Law

A general view shows damage in the aftermath of Israeli strikes in Choueifat, amid the ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, Lebanon, October 6, 2024. REUTERS/Stringer
A general view shows damage in the aftermath of Israeli strikes in Choueifat, amid the ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, Lebanon, October 6, 2024. REUTERS/Stringer
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UN Refugee Chief Says Airstrikes in Lebanon Have Violated Humanitarian Law

A general view shows damage in the aftermath of Israeli strikes in Choueifat, amid the ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, Lebanon, October 6, 2024. REUTERS/Stringer
A general view shows damage in the aftermath of Israeli strikes in Choueifat, amid the ongoing hostilities between Hezbollah and Israeli forces, Lebanon, October 6, 2024. REUTERS/Stringer

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

"Unfortunately, many instances of violations of international humanitarian law in the way the airstrikes are conducted that have destroyed or damaged civilian infrastructure, have killed civilians, have impacted humanitarian operations," he told media in Beirut, Reuters reported.

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 operation.

Fighting had previously been mostly limited to the Israel-Lebanon border area, in parallel to Israel's war in Gaza against Palestinian group Hamas.

Grandi said all parties to the conflict and those with influence on them should "stop this carnage that is happening both 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, the Lebanese health ministry says. Israel says around 50 civilians and soldiers have been killed.

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

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

Grandi said the World Health Organization briefed him "about egregious violations of IHL in respect of health facilities in particular that have been impacted in various locations of Lebanon", using an acronym for international humanitarian law.

Attacks on civilian homes may also be violations, though the matter requires further assessment, he said.

The fighting has led some 220,000 people to cross the Lebanese border with Syria, 70% of whom are Syrians and 30% Lebanese, Grandi said, saying these were conservative estimates.

Israel's bombardment of the main border crossing with Syria at Masnaa on Friday was "a huge obstacle", to those flows of people continuing, he said.

Many of the Syrians leaving Lebanon had sought refuge and fled war and a security crackdown after the onset of the Syrian civil war in 2011.

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