After 13 Years, APN’s Initiative Succeeds in Holding Israel Accountable for Its Environmental Violations in Lebanon | The Arab Group for the Protection of Nature
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The UN General Assembly adopted a resolution in November by the overwhelming majority demanding that Israel pay an immediate $ 856.4 million compensation to Lebanon, due to the massive oil spill along the Lebanese coast resulting from an Israeli air strike during the war on July 15, 2006.

As an active organization against environmental violations in the Arab world, APN launched a campaign to hold the Zionist occupation accountable for polluting the sea in Lebanon after the war in July 2006. APN requested the World Conservation Union to adopt the resolution that is endorsed by all countries on holding “Israel” accountable for the worst environmental disaster in the Middle East.

Razan Zuayter, APN’s General Coordinator and ANFS President, said that APN’s efforts at the time have found international interaction. She also added, the Union raised APN’s objections to the United Nations, which have sent a fact-finding mission to Lebanon as a result of this campaign, to study the actual impact of the oil spill due to the Israeli attack. Zuayter asserted that APN relied on the resolution it submitted to the International Union for Conservation of Nature No. 3.046 issued in 2004 and ratified by most countries regarding the need to protect natural resources in the context of wars and hold stakeholders accountable. The campaign received support from the National Committee of the Federation in Jordan and all member countries.

Today, 13 years later, APN’s efforts to protect nature have yielded great victories in the face of Zionist aggressions, which do not take into account Arab environmental or human rights. It is important to note that the "environmental disaster" caused by the destruction of oil tanks resulted in an oil slick covering the entire Lebanese coast reaching the Syrian coast, causing widespread pollution. 

There were 158 countries who voted in favor of the resolution, 9 opposed (including the United States, Canada, Australia and the Israeli entity), while 6 others abstained. The resolution stated that "the Israeli Government bears the responsibility for prompt and adequate compensation to the Lebanese Government  for the above-mentioned harm and to other countries, who were directly affected by the oil slick, such as Syria, whose coasts have been partially polluted."

The resolution requested Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to report to the General Assembly at its seventy-fifth session in September on the implementation of the resolution. This resolution is issued periodically by the UN General Assembly and is repetitively ignored by the occupation entity and its supporting states.