The World Health Organization (WHO) has said that Israeli forces killed dozens of health care workers over the course of just 24 hours in Lebanon, as Israel expands its tactic of targeting health care workers and facilities.
Israeli forces killed 28 health care workers in Lebanon in just the past day, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a press briefing on Thursday. So far, Israeli forces have killed 1,600 people, including over 100 children, in the past two weeks in Lebanon.
Israel’s attacks on health care in Lebanon have harshly impacted health care, especially in southern Lebanon, the center of many of Israel’s worst massacres. The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs noted on Wednesday that the “health system is under immense strain due to ongoing airstrikes.”
The UN has reported that Israel has forced 40 out of 317 health centers and two hospitals across Lebanon to close due to the violence; over the past two weeks, Israeli strikes have killed at least 50 paramedics alone. Further, Israel has damaged at least six hospitals across southern and eastern Lebanon since October 8, 2023, as well as 25 water facilities.
“Many health workers are not reporting to duty as they fled the areas where they work due to bombardments,” said Tedros on Thursday. “This is severely limiting the provision of mass trauma management and continuity of health services.”
The WHO leader warned that Lebanon may face a shortage of medical supplies as Beirut’s airport has been almost completely closed.
Israel has openly adopted attacks on health care as a military practice in its genocide in Gaza — one of many tactics that seemingly violate international wartime law that Israel is now using on Lebanon. In Gaza, Israel’s bombardments and aid blockade caused a near-total collapse of the health care system just weeks into the genocide.
The health care system is needed more than ever in Lebanon. Israel is carrying out intense shelling in Lebanon, killing nearly the same number of people in Lebanon in just 10 days as were killed in the 2006 Lebanon war, in which Israeli forces unleashed a massive bombing campaign on Lebanon that lasted a little over a month, after Hezbollah attacked an Israeli military patrol.
Israel’s violence is also causing a major displacement crisis. Lebanon Prime Minister Najib Mikati said on Wednesday that at least 1.2 million people across Lebanon, or over a fifth of the population, have been forcibly displaced amid Israel’s attacks.
This number is only rising as Israel continues its attacks and ground invasion into Lebanon. On Thursday, Israeli officials ordered evacuations of over 20 towns and cities in southern Lebanon, with the orders steadily pushing further and further north into the country and away from its border with Israel.
These evacuation orders have left thousands of people in Lebanon with little place to go. Some have fled to Syria, while others are being forced to stay in UN schools that have been converted into shelters. But, like in Gaza, nowhere is guaranteed to be safe from Israel’s strikes.
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