Top UN official warns of risk of widening war in the Middle East

With no Gaza ceasefire deal yet agreed, clashes between Israel and Hezbollah have raised the risk of all-out war in the Middle East.

Transcript

00:00A top U.N. official says the crossfire between Israel and Lebanon is creating a serious risk

00:08of an all-out war in the Middle East. Jean-Pierre Lacroix is concerned about rocket attacks

00:13on Israel from the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militia from their stronghold in southern

00:17Lebanon. The Lebanese government do not have the powers to forcibly disarm the Shiite Islamist

00:23militia. Meanwhile, Israel is conducting regular air strikes on Hezbollah positions in southern

00:29Lebanon. The diplomat recently visited the region and spoke to Euronews about the need

00:34for de-escalation before attending the EU Council of Defence Ministers in Brussels.

00:39So I pay particular attention to the situation there where we have our mission in UNIFIL.

00:49The risk of escalation continues to be very, very serious. And we're talking about regional

00:56escalation because the situation in Gaza and the various other situations in the Middle

01:03East, they're all very much interconnected. Since Israel invaded Gaza, around 90 percent

01:09of the population has been displaced, and around 40,000 people, most of them women and

01:15children, have been killed. On April 1st, Israeli airstrikes on Damascus, the Syrian

01:22capital, killed two senior Iranian officers. Two weeks later, Iran launched its first direct

01:28attack on Israel with a barrage of 300 missiles and drones. On July 31st, Ismail Haniyeh,

01:35a senior Hamas official, was killed in Iran. Israel did not deny responsibility. The day

01:41after, the U.S. reinforced their military deployment in the region, as Iran promised

01:45to retaliate. We've seen episodes of tits for tats, you know, and retaliations, and

01:54that is all contributing to maintaining high risk of regional escalation beyond what we're

02:01already seeing. So obviously the efforts are currently going on as far as the peace talks

02:07in Gaza are critically important. Recently, after 25 years without the disease, polio

02:13has just returned to Gaza. Several members of the U.N. Security Council have discussed

02:19the possibility of creating a peacekeeping mission there. But La Croix says it's premature,

02:24as it would require the agreement of all parties, as well as the unanimous vote of the U.N.

02:28Security Council. Any kind of third party presence, and certainly that applies to U.N.

02:34peacekeeping type of presence, has to be also accepted by the local communities, the local

02:39parties. They have to see that this would bring, that would make a positive difference

02:44in their life. A pause in the fighting is nearing. Israel has just agreed to three pauses

02:51in Gaza from next week to allow polio teams to vaccinate around 640,000 children.