- 7
- 14.10.2023 10:16:00
- 3 min read
The death of a Reuters cameraman in Lebanon during shelling indicates a high risk of expanding the borders of the conflict between Israel and Palestinian Islamists in the region, Antonio Guterres believes.
The death of a Reuters news agency photographer and videographer Issam Abdallah while working in southern Lebanon clearly shows the huge risk that the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas could spread to Lebanon. This statement was made by UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres on Friday, October 13.
On the same day, an official representative of the US State Department, commenting on the news of the death of a Reuters employee at the request of journalists, indicated that the State Department was "aware of reports of the death of journalists in Lebanon" and that government officials were working to collect information on this topic.
Earlier on October 13, the AFP news agency reported that as a result of the shelling, which hit a group of employees of various media outlets in Lebanon, two journalists from AFP, Al-Jazeera and Reuters were injured. It was not specified who exactly conducted the shelling.
Appeal to provide humanitarian aid to Gaza
UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, speaking to reporters in New York on the evening of October 13, also called for immediate access of the population of the Gaza Strip to humanitarian aid. "And wars have rules," he stressed before taking part in a closed-door meeting of the UN Security Council on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
At the same time, Guterres clearly spoke out against Israel's call to evacuate the northern areas of the Gaza Strip. Such a step, affecting about 1.1 million people in a densely populated area, is "extremely dangerous - and in some cases simply impossible," the UN Secretary General said.
At the same time, Guterres called for the immediate release of all hostages taken by Hamas and condemned the manifestations of anti-Semitism, fanaticism directed against Muslims and verbal expression of hatred in any form caused by the conflict between Palestinian Islamists and Israel.
Civilian casualties in Gaza
October 11 expert on international politics, Professor at the Bundeswehr University in Munich Carlo Masala, in an interview with DW, expressed confidence that the IDF will begin to introduce ground troops into Gaza "in the coming hours or days."
At the same time, he pointed out that Israel has done a lot to protect the civilian population in Gaza, however, given the conditions of the operation, it will be impossible to avoid civilian casualties.
