Smoke billows from the site of an Israeli airstrike on the outskirts of the southern village of Habbouch, Lebanon on September 23, 2024. AMA is working on the ground. [Picture: Rabih Daher/AFP/Getty Images]
The Africa Muslims Agency (AMA) is once again on the ground in Lebanon, as Israel bombards the country. At least 558 people, including 50 children, have been killed in airstrikes since Monday.
Speaking in an interview with Salaamedia, while en route to a shelter on Tuesday, the agency’s Ashraf Gangraker said their team had been mobilised to provide essential items. These include warm meals and hygiene packs.
A school in the town of Shheem, 40 kilometres south-east of Beirut, is the place about 100 families will call home while the bombardment goes on. Roads have been congested as people fled the strikes in southern areas.
“Schools have been transformed. School halls have been transformed to places of shelter. We are here and so we need to respond as we are asking everybody to respond. There is a huge need for aid,” said Gangraker.
Just days after conducting deadly pager attacks, and nearly a year since launching a genocidal war in Gaza, Palestine, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu told Lebanese to “get out of harm’s way now”. Gangraker considered this a “mockery”.
“It’s clear the Israeli government’s intention is to escalate and provoke,” Lebanon’s health minister, Dr Firass Abiad, told BBC Radio 4’s World Tonight. “We are in a new stage of war, initially it was targeted attacks but now it’s indiscriminate.”
When he sent occupation forces to the Gaza Strip in October last year, Netanyahu’s stated aim was to eliminate Palestinian resistance group Hamas. In Lebanon, the supposed target is Hezbollah, but many civilians are likely to pay the price.
