Tel Aviv Lights Up City Hall with Lebanon Flag
Lebanon's flag was projected from Tel Aviv's city hall on Wednesday after the devastating Beirut blasts, in Israel's latest gesture towards a country with which it is technically at war.
"Humanity precedes any conflict, and our hearts are with the Lebanese people in the wake of the terrible disaster that befell them," Tel Aviv's Mayor Ron Huldai said on Twitter ahead of the event.
Dozens of Israeli passers-by in Rabin Square below city hall looked on as white, red and green lights on the windows of the large building in the center of the Mediterranean city lit up at 7:55 pm.
Not all Israelis supported the city hall's gesture of solidarity.
Israel's minister for Jerusalem affairs, a member of the far-right Jewish Home party, condemned the move following the explosions at Beirut port that killed more than 110 people and injured thousands of others across the city.
"It is possible and necessary to provide humanitarian aid to civilians who were hurt in Lebanon, but waving an enemy flag in the heart of Tel Aviv is moral confusion," Raffi Peretz wrote on Twitter.
Israel and Lebanon are still technically at war, while tensions with Lebanon's Iran-backed Hizbullah have spiked in recent weeks.
Hizbullah and Israel fought a devastating month-long conflict in 2006 in which Lebanon's infrastructure was battered in heavy Israeli airstrikes.
The war killed more than 1,200 Lebanese, mostly civilians, and 160 Israelis, most of them soldiers.
But on Tuesday, hours after the tragedy in Beirut, right-wing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his National Security Council had offered Lebanon aid, via the U.N.
Addressing Israel's parliament on Wednesday, Netanyahu extended "condolences to the people of Lebanon," and said Israel remained ready to offer "humanitarian assistance" to those affected.
In Gaza, a Palestinian territory where the poverty rate exceeds 50 percent due at least in part to a crippling Israeli blockade, residents of Khan Yunis organized a blood drive for casualties in Beirut.
Israel tightly controls everything that enters and exits the Islamist Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip, but local authorities in Khan Younis said they were working with the Red Cross and Red Crescent to deliver the donated blood to Lebanon.
05 August 2020, 23:00
100
Why do Annahar care so much about Israel?
Syria that you hate so much, they were the first to send dozen of ambulances and medical aid to Lebanon but you do not mention them ofcourse.
05 August 2020, 23:24
04
I seriously can't take anything you say seriously with that awful flag behind you.
05 August 2020, 23:34
02
You mean the ambulances and medical aid Syria paid for through the siphoning of money from Lebanon, and to use for a humanitarian catastrophe caused by the Iranian alliance? Yeah...we should really be praising them. Good point. You always make good points.
06 August 2020, 02:22
05
Let syria take their 2 million refugees back where they came from and leave us alone. Syria has been nothing but a burden on Lebanon. Oh and u know what, hezbulla should go with them too since they would die for their cause.
06 August 2020, 12:13
03
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syrian_occupation_of_Lebanon
In case you forgot.
06 August 2020, 18:03
00
Why do care about Palestinians, when they have stopped fighting with Israel. They have decided to educated themselves and just live their own life. Why must you listen to Iran a non Arab country and fight for the most. Let Iran send its navy to Israel and fight.
Grow up and live your life and find peace in it. Who cares about Iran, Palestine or Israel.
05 August 2020, 23:41
02
realy? you from lebanon?
im from israel and i hope that you do something with all the terror of hizbullah.
come on, you need that, we need that... you can change it right now! GOOD LUCK!
06 August 2020, 11:39
20
no thank you, staring by washing the blood from your hands and confessing to all of your people killing of civilian past and present
06 August 2020, 00:25
03
If the People of Lebanon will look forward for better life they need to kick out all the radical groups and seek for peace with Israel.
Lets forget about the past and look to the future for ours children.
P E A C E ! P E A C E ! P E A C E !
06 August 2020, 00:49
70
People supporting Israel on the Internet will be caught by General Directorate of General Security, so I am sure you are writing from overseas.
IP addresses have been tracked and Israeli sympathizers gets caught in Lebanon.
06 August 2020, 03:48
11
That is a very ignorant thing to say considering Ip addresses don't work that way.
Anyway, I find it funny that Israel had the IDF post the message of solidarity with Lebanon, but hey, foreign affairs hasn't murdered children in the last week, they don't need a PR boost.
06 August 2020, 11:47
02
HEZBOLLAH = terrosit
We will soon discover that hezbollah is behind this explosion you are killer, we lebanese don"t want any war with our neighbours from South or Est neither WEST ;)
06 August 2020, 23:14
00
While I agree with the fact that war with the South will not help and is hopeless, I still think we should keep the embargo on.
06 August 2020, 01:41
03
@levant im with you on that
@mystic we want all the terrorist in lebanon ( politicians and hizballah out of lebanon) they are the one who destructed lebanon.
06 August 2020, 01:45
04
@Mystic and for your information hizballah is not a government, its a terrorist organization and the world doesnt like them. DEAL WITH IT !!! Hizballah has condemned lebanon. never seen a country with an army and a terrorist organization working along. what a shame. Poor you Lebanon. May Allah help us and remove all this useless people from lebanon
06 August 2020, 01:51
31
Speak for yourself. You do not speak for the Lebanese victims of israeli bombs and destruction in Lebanon. Also, why do you need israel to exterminate hizb? If indeed most lebanese are anti hizb as you claim then it should be easy peasy to do it without israel? Or is the lebanese army iranian according to you?
06 August 2020, 08:53
02
Personally... I am skeptical about this... and not sure what to think...
It definitely has a propaganda goal... but at the same time... I know that we would have been incapable of doing the same thing. Some individuals might just have empathy.
I am sure there are good people in Israel... and evil ones... just like here.
06 August 2020, 10:13
04
Hizballa controls Lebanon: banks, industries and government officers. It is no secret. Let's see if they can really fix-up this terrible situation, otherwise - they are truly terror organization.
06 August 2020, 11:29
03
Those who speak against the solidarity Israel is showing with the victims blaming Israel for the destruction of Lebanon, would like to remind the Lebanese that the border with Israel was quiet and peaceful for many year till the decision made by Lebanon to be a safe nest for the PLO terrorists. You can't expect Israel keep quiet when attacks coming from Lebanese soil.
06 August 2020, 11:30
03
Ask the thousands of Syrian citizens who received medical aid from Israel and in Israeli hospitals during their civil war how they were received and dealt with. Then you can see how the Lebanese have their heads so far stuck in the sand that they can't see what is advantageous to them.
Forget politics, we are talking about humanitarianism.
06 August 2020, 12:04
03
To people calling us to appreciate what syria is doing, and jumpinng on the wagon everytime we hate on hezeb and syria and calling us Zionists and that we forgot what israel did to lebanon - NO WE DIDNT - but a simple question imposes itself...
DID YOU FORGET WHAT SYRIA DID TO LEBANON ? you dont remember passing syrian checkpoint ? Lebanese detainees ? Bomb shower of ashrafieh for 100 days? Pillaging of half of metn? Raping of lebanese women?
My house got destroyed twice by syrians. TWICE.
06 August 2020, 12:58
04
to all those who say Israel has lebanese blood on its hands, let us just remind you that it has much much less blood on its hands than the lebanese politicians, Syria and the chiite foreigners who kill their own people! look, it is obvious that our our goverment and hizb al shitan do not even answer to the Israeli call of Aid (while the whole world knows they have the best rescue teams in the world) and why? because they hate Israel more than they love their own country!
Thank you Tel-Aviv for yout sincere support it really means something for us.
@Mystic, your comment about arresting those who support the Tel-Aviv action of solidarity is stupid and useless and shows that what you care about it Iran and not Lebanon. what if you were all arrested for example for betraying your country for some other terror-banned countries like the Iranian regime?
06 August 2020, 19:51
00
Mystic, are you an brainwashed idiot by birth or was it an accident of some sort, maybe a head commotion?
06 August 2020, 20:59
00
For those who reject assistance from Israel, is obsessing about past conflicts really more important than saving the lives and health of Lebanese people today?
Really?
06 August 2020, 22:33
00
Mystic likes to go back to the blood shed but forgets that the Palestinians killed innocents in Damour to start the war. We gave you power since the exit of Israel in 2000 and this is the best you can do... blaming Israel when they don't have any stake in Lebanon for the 20 years plus of mismanagement by your great leaders, Berri and Nasrallah. Now that Iran is going bankrupt and the Iranian people are rising slowly to topple the autoritarian regime, Hizballah is being underfunded and used as mercenaries in Syria and Yemen. Puppets to a cold war that has nothing to do with you while Chia's in the south and in Beirut are dying of hunger. Good job for putting us on the map. From Paris of the middle east to abidjan of the middle east. You have something to be proud of!!
