Lebanon receives first UN aid plane since Israel escalation
Authorities have said the violence has displaced more than one million people
Beirut: A delivery of medical supplies from the United Nations reached Lebanon on Friday, a first since last week’s escalation between Israel and Hezbollah, said a UN agency and a Lebanese minister.
“An airlift... landed in Beirut earlier this morning with 30 metric tonnes of trauma and surgical supplies, enough to treat tens of thousands people,” the World Health Organisation’s regional director Hanan Balkhy said on social media platform X.
“More flights are arriving later today and tomorrow, carrying trauma supplies, cholera supplies and mental health supplies,” she added.
Rapidly esclating Israeli strikes since September 23, targeting Iran-backed Hezbollah militants, have killed more than 1,100 people in Lebanon and wounded hundreds more, according to an AFP tally of official figures.
Lebanese authorities said the violence has also displaced more than one million people from their homes in the tiny Mediterranean country, already mired in economic and political crises.
Health Minister Firass Abiad was at the Beirut airport on Friday to receive the aid organised by the World Health Organisation and UN refugee agency UNHCR and funded by the United Arab Emirates.
“We are receiving the first shipment out of many,” he said.
The shipment included “many trauma kits that will be crucial to support the hospitals as they receive the casualties from the Israeli attacks on Lebanon,” he added.