He added that all Security Council resolutions related to ending Middle East conflicts must be implemented, including resolution 2817, which called for an end to Iran’s attacks on neighboring states.
Return to the disruption of the COVID era
“Beyond the immediate consequences in Lebanon, the conflict has also caused significant knock-on effects on global humanitarian operations; we are really feeling the pain of this,” WFP Deputy Executive Director Carl Skau told reporters in Geneva. “Our supply chains may actually be on the brink of the most serious disruption since COVID and the Ukraine war in 2022..”
Skau said aid operations are being affected by longer shipping times and increased costs as escalating violence in the Middle East continues into its third week, sparked by Israeli and US strikes on Iran and retaliatory strikes by Tehran and allied groups.
Running costs increase
Amid ongoing hostilities – including Iranian counterattacks against the Gulf States and Israeli strikes against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon – WFP effortsTransportation costs “have increased 18 percent so far and we have thousands of trucks on the roads every day.” explained Mr. Skau. “Now they run on much more expensive fuel because of oil prices.”
He deplored the impact of rising costs that “means we can buy less food or provide less cash to beneficiaries.”
The agency has been fforced to cut food rations for people in famine conditions in Sudan and can only support one in four acutely malnourished children in Afghanistan (currently the world’s worst malnutrition crisis).
Another important concern is related to the disruption of global fertilizer markets “Just as sub-Saharan Africa approaches planting season,” Skau said.
A quarter of the world’s fertilizer supply passes through the Strait of Hormuz, “which is now practically paralyzed,” he explained.
Skau stressed that rising global food and fuel costs “could leave millions of families without access to basic foodstuffs, particularly in import-dependent countries such as sub-Saharan Africa and Asia.”
“If the conflict in the Middle East continues into June, another 45 million people could be pushed into acute hunger due to rising prices.”, he warned.
“This would take global hunger levels to an all-time high and it is a terrible, terrible prospect.”
Impact of the attacks in the Gulf
Meanwhile, the humanitarian effects of the disruption to air traffic continue to be acutely felt in Lebanon, one of the epicenters of the conflict, the top UN aid official in the country, Imran Riza, told reporters in Geneva.
“In 2024 (during the previous Israel-Lebanon conflict) we received an incredible amount of assistance from the Gulf States, from the Saudis, from Qatar, from the United Arab Emirates, from Oman, from Bahrain… We received a lot from Kuwait, and none of that is happening,” he said. “The airlift is no longer there.”
Displacement and humanitarian needs throughout Lebanon have increased as a result of Israeli airstrikes and movement orders covering increasing portions of the small Middle Eastern nation’s territory.
Mr. Riza said that 132,700 people stay in some 622 shelters but the total number of those who have had to flee their homes probably exceeds one million.
“If you think that the population of Lebanon, both citizens and refugees…, is close to five and a half million, (we are) talking about almost 20 percent of the people living in Lebanon have been displaced, and this is going to continue,” he said.
The evacuation orders apply to southern Lebanon, the southern suburbs of Beirut and parts of the Bekaa.
About 70 percent of the displaced are not in shelters.Riza said, creating challenges for aid workers trying to reach them.
He also explained that due to military operations it has become very difficult to access people who refuse to leave their villages.
He spoke in particular of older people, “people who cannot physically move and are very afraid to go out.”
“There are very vulnerable people who are left behind, and there are others who do not want to risk losing their homes and their villages.”
Concerns about forced displacement
Recalling that Israel has extended its warning and displacement orders to all of southern Lebanon, “adding the region between the Litani and Zahrani rivers to the wide swaths of Lebanese territory already covered,” UN Human Rights Office (OHCHR) spokesperson Thameen Al-Kheetan warned that these orders “may amount to forced displacement,” which is prohibited by international humanitarian law.
He highlighted that in many cases, Israeli airstrikes “have destroyed entire residential buildings in dense urban environments, and multiple members of the same family, including women and children, are often killed together.”
Listen to an interview with Christophe Boulierac, Head of Advocacy and Communication at UNICEF Lebanon:
The OHCHR official added that people displaced by the fighting and living in tents along Beirut’s waterfront have been hit by airstrikes, while aAt least 16 medical staff have been killed in recent days..
“Statements by Israeli officials threatening to impose the same level of destruction on Lebanon as that inflicted on Gaza are totally unacceptable.”Mr Al-Kheetan insisted.
“Such rhetoric, coupled with the Israeli military’s announcement that it would deploy additional forces and expand its ground incursion, intensifies the deep fear and anxiety among the Lebanese population,” he said.