Canada urges citizens to leave Lebanon ‘while they can’

TORONTO (AFP): Canada on Tuesday urged its citizens in Lebanon to leave “while they can,” warning of the risk of escalating violence between Israel and Hezbollah in the region.

Foreign Minister Melanie Joly in a statement called for Canadians to depart while commercial flights remain in operation.

“The security situation in Lebanon is becoming increasingly volatile and unpredictable due to sustained and escalating violence between Hezbollah and Israel and could deteriorate further without warning,” she said.

“If the armed conflict intensifies,” she said, it could make it harder to leave the country and for Canada to provide consular services to tens of thousands of Canadians believed to be living in the country.

Ottawa is not offering to evacuate Canadians and an advisory warns against travel to Lebanon.

Tensions have been rising with growing exchanges of fire between Israel and Lebanon’s Iranian-backed militant movement Hezbollah.

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said Israeli forces are winding up the most intense part of the Gaza war and will redeploy to the northern border, although he cast the move as defensive.