BRIEFING NOTES: (1) Lebanon;(2) Israel-OPT; (3) Afghanistan

Spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights: Thameen Al-Kheetan joined by Ajith Sunghay - Head of OHCHR in OPT via Zoom (from Amman)

Location: Geneva

Date: 17 March 2026

Subject: (1) Lebanon; (2) Israel-OPT; (3) Afghanistan

(1) Lebanon

Another tragic chapter in Lebanon’s history is being written, bringing more suffering to civilians.

Since 2 March, at least 886 people have been killed, including at least 111 children, according to Lebanese authorities. Israeli airstrikes have destroyed hundreds of homes and civilian infrastructure, including healthcare facilities. At the same time, Hezbollah fighters have launched indiscriminate barrages of rockets at Israel, injuring people and causing damage to residential buildings and other civilian infrastructure.

In many instances, Israeli airstrikes have destroyed entire residential buildings in dense urban environments, with multiple members of the same family, including women and children, often killed together. Such attacks raise serious concerns under international humanitarian law. People displaced by the fighting and living in tents along Beirut’s seafront have also been hit. And in recent days, at least 16 medical staff have been killed.

International humanitarian law demands distinction between military targets, and civilians and civilian objects, and insists on feasible precautions being taken to protect civilians. Deliberately attacking civilians or civilian objects amounts to a war crime. In addition, international law provides for specific protections for healthcare workers, as well as people at heightened risk, such as the elderly, women and displaced people.

Meanwhile, Israel has extended its extensive warnings and displacement orders across southern Lebanon, adding the region between the Litani and Zahrani rivers to the broad swath of Lebanese territory already covered by such measures. These orders may amount to forced displacement, prohibited under international humanitarian law.

Large numbers of displaced people have lost their homes, and are left without any safe place to stay. Entire families are sleeping in makeshift tents on the streets, exposed to harsh weather such as the recent storms. Others remain in temporary shelters or with host communities, where overcrowding is reaching breaking point. Multiple families are squeezed into single apartments or shared spaces, with tensions rising amid soaring living costs.

With this displacement comes a wide array of human rights concerns: proper healthcare, sufficient food and drinking water are lacking. Education has been interrupted for another academic year, freedom of movement no longer exists, and livelihoods have now been lost. And while people are displaced, Israeli attacks are destroying and damaging their houses, farmland, and other civilian infrastructure.

We have also received reports of discrimination against displaced people in the Lebanese rental market, alongside a rise in hateful rhetoric targeting certain communities on social media.

Those who have stayed in southern Lebanon now face heightened isolation and growing obstacles to access humanitarian aid, as Israeli airstrikes have destroyed bridges linking the south to the rest of the country.

Statements by Israeli officials threatening to impose the same level of destruction on Lebanon as inflicted in Gaza are wholly unacceptable. Such rhetoric, coupled with the Israeli military’s announcement that it will deploy additional forces and expand its ground incursion, intensify deep fear and anxiety among the Lebanese population.

UN Human Rights Chief Volker Türk urges an immediate cessation of hostilities, and accountability for all violations. He encourages the international community to support the humanitarian response in Lebanon.

(2) Israel-OPT

The Israeli government has accelerated unlawful settlement expansion and annexation of large parts of the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, forcibly displacing over 36,000 Palestinians amid increasing violence by Israeli security forces and settlers.

These are findings of a new report by UN Human Rights, covering the 12-month period up to 31 October 2025. The report documents increasing incidents of settler violence resulting in killings, injuries and property damage, as well as relentless harassment, intimidation, and destruction of Palestinian homes and farmland.

Settler violence continued in a coordinated, strategic and largely unchallenged manner, with Israeli authorities playing the central role in directing, participating in or enabling this conduct. Longstanding and pervasive impunity is facilitating and encouraging violence against and harassment of Palestinians.

To read the full press release and the report, please click here

(3) Afghanistan

Last night’s tragic blast at a drug rehabilitation centre in Kabul, that reportedly left scores of patients dead, must be investigated promptly, independently and transparently, and those responsible held to account in line with international standards. Those results must be made public. Victims and victims’ families are entitled to reparations.

Witnesses described a scene of total destruction at the hospital site, and seeing hundreds of people looking for their relatives.

Under international humanitarian law, civilians and civilian objects are strictly protected. The laws of war clearly spell out that any attack must comply with the fundamental principles of distinction, proportionality and precautions. International humanitarian law provides for specific and increased protections for medical facilities.

Since the hostilities between Pakistan and Afghanistan escalated at the end of last month, 289 Afghan civilians, including 104 children and 59 women, have been killed or injured. Tens of thousands, mostly in the south and southeast of the country, have been displaced by the fighting.

In Pakistan, many have also been forced to flee their homes and schools have been closed.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk reiterates his call on all parties to take effective measures to ensure the protection of civilians, in line with their obligations under international human rights law and international humanitarian law. He calls for an immediate end to hostilities, and for all parties to ensure humanitarian aid reaches those desperately in need.

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