PARIS, July 14: Foreigners were on Friday advised to evacuate Lebanon and suspend all travel to the country as Israeli forces pounded suspected Hezbollah strongholds there for the third day, raising fears of full-scale war.
France, Germany, Greece, the Philippines, Spain and the United States were among those which issued warnings to their citizens either living in the conflict zone or planning trips there amid the escalating violence.
The US State Department warned Americans against travelling to Lebanon, authorised embassy personnel and their families to evacuate and advised other US citizens there to ‘keep a low profile’.
“In light of the events of July 12 in southern Lebanon and the resulting escalation in tensions in Lebanon, including the closure of Beirut International Airport and the Port of Beirut, American citizens are urged to avoid non-essential travel in Lebanon,” it said in a statement.
“There remains the possibility of anti-US demonstrations and American citizens are reminded that even demonstrations intended to be peaceful can turn confrontational and possibly escalate into violence.”
It warned that people should take special care when travelling in the southern suburbs of Beirut, parts of the Bekaa Valley and South Lebanon, and Sidon and Tripoli cities, noting the danger of armed Hezbollah forces and Palestinian groups ‘hostile to both the Lebanese government and the US’ operating from refugee camps inside Lebanon.
Israeli attacks have left Lebanon virtually cut off from the outside world, targeting the southern suburbs of Beirut, the country’s only international airport as well as bridges and roads across the south of the country.
With no sign of a lull in the attacks, Greece and Spain announced they were evacuating their nationals from Lebanon.
“Certain Spanish citizens present in Lebanon have expressed their desire to receive assistance from the Spanish embassy to leave the country,” the foreign ministry in Madrid said in a statement.
Of some 700 Spanish citizens in Lebanon, 150 would be evacuated by bus on Friday toward Syria, it said.
Greece said it was preparing to evacuate around 50 of its nationals to Syria. An Olympic Airlines plane is preparing to fly to the airport of Damascus, Syria, to collect them, the foreign ministry said in Athens.
The Philippines, which has an estimated 30,000 citizens working in Lebanon, imposed a ban on travel there and ordered diplomatic missions in the Middle East to facilitate Filipino travellers’ ‘immediate return’.
“We are looking at our contingency plans,” foreign department spokesman Gilbert Asuque said in Manila, while stressing that no decision had been made on evacuation.
The French government said it was preparing to evacuate its embassy in Lebanon and recommended citizens avoid all travel to the country. A special hotline has been set up for people with relatives in Lebanon, it said.
“Taking into account the situation prevailing in Lebanon, the foreign ministry formally advises against any travel to this country and encourages French citizens who are currently there to stay in their homes,” a foreign ministry statement said in Paris.
Five thousand French tourists are believed to be in Lebanon in addition to about 17,000 French residents who are registered with the consular service there.
EXODUS: Thousands of Lebanese poured across the border into Syria on Friday to escape Israeli bombing, expanding an exodus that had mostly consisted of foreign nationals since the violence erupted two days ago.
People of all walks of life made their way on foot and by car to the main Masnaa-Jdaideh crossing on the Beirut-Damascus road, although the mountainous route was hit by Israeli planes. Others crossed at a border point near the Mediterranean coast.
“We managed to get here through back roads, but bombs were falling all around us. It took a whole day,” said Mohammad Mahdi, a resident of Nabatiyeh in south Lebanon, the focal point of Israeli strikes.
Israel kept up its attack on Hezbollah targets and devastated a number of Lebanese civilian installations on Friday, despite world criticism of its tactics since the Lebanese group seized two of its soldiers and killed eight.
About 17,000 people left for Syria through the Masnaa crossing on the edge of the Bekaa valley on Friday, Lebanese officials said, adding that they were mostly Lebanese from the south and Syrian workers, who constitute the backbone of Lebanon’s construction sector.
Israeli bombing from land, sea and air, and a naval and air blockade has turned Syrian border crossings into Lebanon’s only outlet to the world.
“It has been an ordeal throughout. Bombs fell near our apartment in Beirut and the border crossing is chaos,” said one woman, who gave her first name as Tamara, at the northern crossing of Arida.
“We have become refugees,” another Lebanese woman said.—AFP/Reuters
