Matthew Hollingworth, Lebanon’s World Food Program (WFP) country director, said from Beirut that it was impossible to immediately meet the needs of more than 1 million people.
They are suddenly displaced from their homes and have no access to resources.
He said that it is not a ready country to deal with this situation, as it has faced many challenges in the last few years. “So it’s going to be a struggle.”
A week ago, the United Nations issued an appeal for $426 million to provide aid to people affected by the Lebanon crisis, for which only 12 percent has been contributed so far.
Matthew Hollingsworth says humanitarian aid groups are committed to reaching those in need. Currently, a large number of the poor are people who have been forced to leave their homes without any belongings due to the sudden escalation of fighting.
A senior WFP official said that those displaced over the past year had been prepared for the situation, but in the past few days many people had left their homes within hours of being bombed.
Against the background of the Gaza war, Israel is carrying out massive bombings in Beirut and southern Lebanon. Beirut’s south and Lebanon’s border with Israel are quiet after millions of people have left.
“Many of these cities, villages and outlying areas are now nothing more than piles of rubble.”
The country is struggling with rising poverty levels following the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2020 explosion that devastated Beirut’s port. There are more than 1 million Syrian refugees in Lebanon.
great value
Meanwhile, Jeremy Lawrence, spokesman for the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, issued a new appeal for an end to the violence in Gaza.
On Tuesday, he said, in the end, the common citizen has to pay the price of this violence. Hospitals are closed, a million are displaced, civilians are being killed, schools are damaged and the devastation in Lebanon is beyond the imagination of the people there, as is the case in Gaza. “We cannot let this happen again.”
More than two million people are staying in 973 formal shelters set up in Beirut and the northern part of the country. More than 770 shelters are overcrowded.
WFP official Hollingsworth said many people decided to flee their homes because not only were their homes and land destroyed, but they also lost family, friends and communities. And they fear that something unpleasant may happen in the future.
The UN agency’s update comes as reports of fresh Hezbollah rocket attacks hit the northern Israeli city of Haifa.
The armed group Hezbollah has fired rockets into Israel since the start of the war in Gaza, forcing thousands of Israeli civilians to flee.
Attack on health services
The World Health Organization said that since September 16, there have been 17 attacks on healthcare workers and health facilities, killing 65 and injuring 42.
In southern Lebanon, 96 health care centers have been forced to close, and five hospitals are out of business because their infrastructure has been damaged.
UN humanitarian workers have insisted that land, air and sea routes must be kept open for aid deliveries to Lebanon, which depends on imports for most of its needs.