Edited News | OHCHR , UNOG
“We are extremely alarmed by the sharp escalation of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah and call on all parties to immediately cease the violence and to ensure the protection of civilians,” UN Human Rights Office spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani said.
“Yesterday marked the deadliest day of violence in years, with reports of at least 492 killed and 1,645 injured following a series of Israeli airstrikes across Lebanon,” Shamdasani told the weekly press briefing in Geneva.
“Lebanon’s health ministry said 35 children and 58 women were among those killed, as well as a number of medical workers. On a personal note, one of our UN Human Rights colleagues in Beirut lost seven of her family members yesterday including two children aged eight and one in an Israeli airstrike in South Lebanon,” she said.
“Roads in southern Lebanon are crammed with people in cars fleeing the violence. This latest violence follows last week’s deadly pager and two-way radio attacks in Lebanon and Syria, and the firing of hundreds of rockets by Hezbollah into Israel from Lebanon,” she added.
“International humanitarian law is very clear. All parties to an armed conflict must at all times distinguish between the civilian population and combatants and between civilian objects and military objectives. Constant care must be taken to spare the civilian population and civilian objects. The laws of war also oblige all parties to observe the principle of proportionality,” Shamdasani stressed.
“Incidents in which any civilians – including children and medical workers – are killed or seriously injured, potentially in violation of international law, must be subject to independent, thorough, and transparent investigations into the circumstances of the attacks,” she said.
“The UN High Commissioner Volker Türk calls on all States and actors with influence in the region and beyond to avert further escalation and do everything they can to ensure full respect for international law,” said Shamdasani.
ENDS
For more information and media requests, please contact:
In Geneva
Ravina Shamdasani - + 41 22 917 9169 / ravina.shamdasani@un.org or
Liz Throssell - + 41 22 917 9296 / elizabeth.throssell@un.org or
Jeremy Laurence - +41 22 917 9383 / jeremy.laurence@un.org
Tag and share
Twitter @UNHumanRights
Facebook unitednationshumanrights
Instagram @unitednationshumanrights
STORY: UN Human Rights Spokesperson Ravina Shamdasani on escalating hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah.
TRT: 02:27
SOURCE: OHCHR / UNOG
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: English/NATS
ASPECT RATIO: 16:9
DATELINE: 24 September 2024 – GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
SHOTLIST
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR
UN Human Rights Spokesperson Jeremy Laurence on deadly attacks by the Rapid Support Forces in Sudan
1
1
1
Edited News | OCHA , OHCHR , UNITED NATIONS , WFP , WHO
Gaza: Famine “irrefutably” confirmed, UN humanitarians unite in plea for aid access
Famine has been confirmed in Gaza Governorate by the world’s top authority on food security and will spread further within the Strip unless fighting stops and much more aid is allowed in, UN humanitarians said on Friday.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR
UN Human Rights Spokesperson Jeremy Laurence on the eighth anniversary of military assault on the Rohingya in Myanmar
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR
UN Human Rights Spokesperson Jeremy Laurence on the declared famine in Gaza Governorate
3
36
1
2
Edited News , Statements , Images , Conferences | HRC , OCHA , UNOG
A record 383 aid workers were killed last year with hundreds more wounded, kidnapped and detained, the UN’s top aid official said on Tuesday in a call for accountability, at a solemn ceremony in Geneva to mark World Humanitarian Day.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR
UN Human Rights Office spokesperson Thameen Al-Kheetan made the following statement at today’s biweekly press briefing in Geneva:
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR
“In Gaza, the Israeli army has intensified its attacks in the north of the strip,” UN Human Rights Office spokesperson Thameen Al-Kheetan told the biweekly press briefing in Geneva on Tuesday.
1
1
1
Edited News | OHCHR , OCHA
Gaza: Aid insufficient to avert ‘widespread starvation’ as Israeli military ramp-up forces more people to flee
The small trickle of aid entering Gaza is totally insufficient to alleviate starvation and displacement in the Strip, UN humanitarians said on Tuesday.
1
1
1
Edited News | WHO
Gaza: Hospitals continue to overflow with people injured while seeking food - WHO
As besieged Palestinian civilians face widespread malnutrition and starvation, hospitals in the Strip are increasingly overwhelmed by the influx of victims of shootings and other injuries at food distribution areas, warns the World Health Organization.
1
1
1
Edited News | UNHCR , WHO , UNMAS
Urgent help is needed to halt a deadly cholera outbreak that is sweeping across Sudan, UN agencies said on Friday, while warning that communities continue to be terrorized by parties to the conflict even as they flee violence.
2
2
1
2
Press Conferences , Edited News , Images | UNEP
Negotiations got under way at UN Geneva on Tuesday to agree on a legally binding treaty to curb plastic pollution, with delegates from nearly 180 countries attending.
1
1
1
Edited News | OCHA , UNICEF
Gaza: Hundreds of trucks per day of free aid needed “for months”, in addition to commercial supplies - OCHA
Despite the tactical pauses Israel introduced last week to allow some safe passage for humanitarian convoys, the amount of aid that has entered Gaza remains by far insufficient for the starving population, and UN trucks continue to face impediments on their way to delivering aid.