The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has warned of Israel’s attempt to widen the conflict to divert attention away from its war on Gaza, Palestinian news agency Wafa reported.

The ministry cautioned that Israel is attempting to distract from its actions against Palestinians there and reiterated its call for a ceasefire, the agency said.

In a separate statement, the ministry condemned Israel’s attacks on Lebanon.

“The Ministry views these actions as blatant violations of international law and humanitarian principles, as well as an attempt to further escalate war to destabilise the region,” it stated.

This came as Israel struck hundreds of Hezbollah targets in southern Lebanon overnight and during Tuesday, September 24, 2024, with the death toll from the recent wave of attacks now nearing 560 people.

Israel claimed to have killed Ibrahim Qubaisi, the Head of Hezbollah’s missile systems, in what it described as a targeted attack on the southern suburbs of Beirut.

In a statement, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said that Qubaisi was killed in an airstrike carried out by Israeli fighter jets in the the Dahiyeh suburb.

It added that other senior officers in Hezbollah’s rocket and missile division were at the apartment where the commander was killed.

Lebanon’s health ministry noted that the “Israeli enemy raid on Ghobeiri in Beirut’s southern suburbs killed six people and injured 15.”

Meanwhile, Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu issued a statement telling Lebanese citizens that the war is “not with you, our war is with Hezbollah.”

In a video message posted to X and translated by a news agenct, the Israeli leader said that the head of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, was “leading you to the brink of the abyss… Rid yourself from Nasrallah’s grip, for your own good.”

He also warned that “anyone who has a missile in their living room and a rocket in their garage will not have a home”.

UN Secretary-General Says World Cannot Afford ‘Lebanon To Become Another Gaza’

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said that the world “cannot afford Lebanon to become another Gaza” at the UN General Assembly.

Citing wars in Ukraine, the Gaza Strip and Sudan he denounced what he said was a growing number of governments and other groups who feel they are “entitled to a get out of jail free card.”

Without specifying who, he said, “They can trample international law. They can violate the United Nations Charter. They can invade another country, lay waste to whole societies, or utterly disregard the welfare of their own people.”

“And nothing will happen. The level of impunity in the world is politically indefensible and morally intolerable,” he added.

On Lebanon specifically he stated, “Lebanon is at the brink. The people of Lebanon – the people of Israel – and the people of the world – cannot afford Lebanon to become another Gaza.”

The Brazilian President, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, a longtime critic of the war in Gaza, has dialed up his denunciation of Israel during his address to the UN general assembly in New York.

The South American leftist said that the Gaza Strip and West Bank were already suffering “one of biggest humanitarian crises in recent times” and voiced concern that the conflict was now spreading “dangerously” into Lebanon.

“What began as an act of terror carried out by fanatics against innocent Israeli civilians has turned into the collective punishment of all the Palestinian people. There have been more than 40,000 fatal victims – the majority women and children.

“The right to self-defence has become the right to revenge that stands in the way of a deal for the liberation of hostages and delays a cease fire.”
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva

Speaking at the UN after Lula, Colombia’s Gustavo Petro also slammed the “genocide” he said was unfolding in Gaza and called Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu “a criminal”.