UN condemns Israel's warnings of devastating Gaza-style assault on Lebanon as intolerable

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Threats from Israeli officials to unleash Gaza-level destruction on Lebanon are “wholly unacceptable”, the UN said Tuesday, and warned that “deliberately attacking civilians or civilian objects amounts to a war crime”.

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Israel has stepped up strikes and deployed ground troops to its northern neighbour since March 2, when Lebanon was dragged into the Middle East war after Tehran ally Hezbollah attacked Israel with rockets in retaliation for the killing of Iranian supreme leader Ali Khamenei.

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More than a million people have been displaced across Lebanon, while Israeli strikes have killed 886 people, including 67 women and 111 children, since March 2, Lebanon’s health ministry says.

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“Another tragic chapter in Lebanon’s history is being written,” United Nations rights office spokesman Thameen Al-Kheetan told reporters in Geneva.

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He said the situation was already “catastrophic”, voicing alarm at comments from Israeli officials suggesting that parts of Lebanon would face devastation similar to Gaza.

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Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich warned last week that the southern Beirut suburb of Dahiyeh, a Hezbollah stronghold, would “very soon … resemble Khan Yunis” — a southern Gaza city which has been heavily damaged by Israeli bombardments during the two-and-a-half-year war with Hamas.

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“Statements by Israeli officials threatening to impose the same level of destruction on Lebanon as inflicted in Gaza are wholly unacceptable,” Kheetan said.

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“Such rhetoric, coupled with the Israeli military’s announcement that it will deploy additional forces and expand its ground incursion, intensify deep fear and anxiety among the Lebanese population,” he warned.

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– Investigations needed –

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Already, he said, Israel’s attacks “raise serious concerns under international humanitarian law”.

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He pointed out a number of the Israeli airstrikes raining down on Lebanon “have destroyed entire residential buildings in dense urban environments, with multiple members of the same family, including women and children, often killed together”.

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“People displaced by the fighting and living in tents along Beirut’s seafront have also been hit. And in recent days, at least 16 medical staff have been killed,” he said.

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Kheetan stressed that international law “demands distinction between military targets, and civilians and civilian objects”.

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“Deliberately attacking civilians or civilian objects amounts to a war crime.”

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There was a need, he said, for “proper investigations in each and every incident where civilians are impacted in order to establish the responsibilities, including the intent”.

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Kheetan also decried Israel’s “extensive warnings and displacement orders across southern Lebanon”, cautioning that “these orders may amount to forced displacement, prohibited under international humanitarian law”.

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The UN humanitarian coordinator for Lebanon, Imran Riza, warned that “civilians are paying a very, very high price and displacement is increasing incredibly quickly right now”.

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He pointed to numbers from the Norwegian Refugee Council indicating that around 14 percent of Lebanese territory was now covered by Israeli evacuation orders.

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Currently, “almost 20 percent” of the country’s 5.8 million population is displaced, he said, adding that around 70 percent of them were not in shelters.

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