Canterbury-Bankstown Council votes to raise Lebanese flag
A southwest Sydney council has unanimously voted to fly the Lebanon flag outside its chambers in solidarity with its people amid ongoing conflict in the Middle Eastern nation.
The Express
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A southwest Sydney council has unanimously voted to fly the Lebanese flag outside its chambers in solidarity with its people amid ongoing conflict in the Middle Eastern country’s south.
At Tuesday’s meeting, Canterbury-Bankstown Council unanimously decided to raise the flag on November 22 outside its current Bankstown and old Canterbury chambers.
The council will also hold a special interfaith prayer vigil and also proposed to hold a candlelight vigil.
The day coincides with Lebanon’s National Day of Independence and marks a year since the council became the first to raise the Palestinian flag in solidarity with Gaza.
Speaking at the meeting on Tuesday, Mayor Bilal El-Hayek said: “It’s not easy to bring this mayoral minute before council but circumstances and recent events in Lebanon necessitate me to do so.”
“My birthplace, and the birthplace of tens of thousands of residents in our city is burning, blasted by intense bombing raids that are both relentless and deadly.
“The devastation in and around the capital Beirut, once described as the Paris of the Middle East, is heartbreaking.”
According to the Lebanese Health Ministry, Israeli onslaught on Southern Lebanon has killed 2574 people and wounded 12,001 since September 23 – making it the deadliest conflict between Israel and Hezbollah since the Civil War.
In Gaza, the death toll has reportedly climbed to 42,792, and more than 100,000 wounded, since Israel began its bombardment on October 8 following Hamas’ attack on a music festival a year earlier.
Since then, at least 223 United Nations Relief and Works Agency aid workers have been killed by Israeli strikes.
On Monday, British aid group Oxfam strongly condemned the killing of four of its water engineers who were on their way to repair infrastructure in southern Gaza.
And according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, as of Wednesday, at least 128 journalists and media workers had been killed by Israeli attacks.
Of those, the agency determined at least five journalists were directly were directly targeted by Israeli forces, including Reuters’ Issam Abdallah, Al Jazeera’s Hamza Al Dahdouh, Ismail Al Ghoul and Rami Al Refee, and freelancer Mustafa Thuraya.
Mr El-Hayek said: “The scale of this humanitarian crisis and the numbers of lives lost and injured, will not be known until peace returns to the region.
“All lives matter, no matter the colour of your skin, your religious beliefs or your place of birth. The world must unite and demand and end to hostilities.”
On Tuesday, the council moved to petition the Australian government to establish humanitarian funding to Lebanon.
Councillor George Zakhia said with more than 20 per cent of the country’s Lebanese community living in the Canterbury-Bankstown area, this was an issue directly affecting the community.
“Were not asking for weapons or missiles, we’re asking for critical food aid,” Mr Zakhia said.
“Both the federal and state governments must do more as (Lebanon) faces a humanitarian disaster.”
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