Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati announced in a government memorandum that Wednesday, October 18, will be “a day of national mourning for the martyrs and victims who fell as a result of the massacres and attacks committed by the Israeli enemy. With the most recent attack, the massacre that targeted defenseless civilians in the Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza, constituting a disgrace in the record of humanity.”
He added: “Flags raised over all departments, official institutions, and municipalities will be lowered in mourning, and regular programs on radio and television stations will be modified in accordance with this momentous event.”
He continued: “There were hundreds of martyrs at Al-Ahli hospital in Gaza due to Israeli criminal acts, and the world’s conscience remains silent in the face of injustice and law. Until when?”
In response, the Minister of Education, Abbas Al-Halabi, declared the closure of public and private schools, high schools, institutes, and vocational schools, as well as the Lebanese University and private universities.
“This decision comes in denunciation and condemnation of the massacre that exceeded all expectations, committed by the Zionist enemy in the bombing of the Baptist Hospital in Palestine,” affirmed Halabi.
He considered the massacre committed by Israel a “disgraceful crime against humanity” and condemned “the countries that remain silent in the face of the erasure and burning of a people and the killing of the sick and the innocent.”
Demonstrations are currently occurring across the country. Protestors are calling for a demonstration in front of the US Embassy in Awkar.
Furthermore, Lebanese leaders also reacted on Tuesday evening to the Israeli attack on the Al-Ahli Al-Maamadani hospital in Gaza.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs denounced the Israeli attack as “the most heinous war crime that has claimed hundreds of martyrs and victims among Palestinian civilians at Al-Ahli Al-Maamadani hospital in Gaza.”
The statement went as follows: “Once again, Israel is disregarding international law and committing a war crime against humanity against a besieged population, victims of deliberate and systematic genocide. Lebanon once again calls on the international community to intervene immediately to put an end to the Israeli massacres and establish a ceasefire, to allow the delivery of humanitarian and medical aid to the Gaza Strip, and to care for the victims.”
For his part, Speaker of Parliament Nabih Berri asserted, “Only condemning Israel for the Palestinian bloodshed that occurred this evening at the Al-Ahli Al-Maamadani hospital in the Gaza Strip, and the manner in which it occurred, is not enough.”
He asked, “Will the world’s conscience awaken to put the brakes on the Israeli extermination machine, which is not only aimed at the Palestinian people but at humanity as a whole?”
Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah movement on Tuesday called for a “day of rage” to condemn a strike on a Gaza Strip hospital, blaming Israel for what it called a “massacre.”
