At UNSC, UN rights chief says Israel’s attacks on Hezbollah devices violated international law and could be a war crime.

A senior United Nations official has told the Security Council that further violence between Israel and Iran-aligned groups Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon risked igniting a far more damaging conflict.

“We risk seeing a conflagration that could dwarf even the devastation and suffering witnessed so far,” UN political affairs chief Rosemary DiCarlo told the 15-member council on Friday, which met about attacks this week on Hezbollah.

“It is not too late to avoid such folly. There is still room for diplomacy,” she said. “I also strongly urge member states with influence over the parties to leverage it now.”

As its war in Gaza nears one year old, Israel killed at least 14 people and wounded 66 in an air raid on the Lebanese capital Beirut on Friday.

The Israeli military claimed that a top Hezbollah commander and other senior figures in the Lebanese movement were among the dead, and pledged to conduct a new military campaign until it secures the area around the Lebanese border.

Hezbollah has not confirmed the deaths of any commanders on Friday.

Israel’s air raid followed two days of attacks in which Hezbollah pagers and walkie-talkies exploded, killing 37 people and wounding thousands. Those attacks were widely believed to have been carried out by Israel, which has neither confirmed nor denied its involvement.

On Friday, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk told the Security Council that the attack on Hezbollah communications devices violated international law and could constitute a war crime.

Turk said it was “difficult to conceive” how the attacks on Hezbollah’s communications devices “could possibly conform with the key principles of distinction, proportionality, and precautions in attack, under international humanitarian law”.

He added that he was “appalled” by the attacks using communication devices.

“This has unleashed widespread fear, panic and horror among people in Lebanon, already suffering in an increasingly volatile situation since October 2023 and crumbling under a severe and longstanding economic crisis. This cannot be the new normal,” he said.

Turk called for an independent, thorough and transparent investigation and for those who ordered and carried out the attacks to be held to account.

Deputy US Ambassador to the UN Robert Wood told the council that the US expects all parties to comply with international humanitarian law and take all reasonable steps to minimise harm to civilians, especially in densely populated areas.

“It is imperative that even as facts emerge about the latest incidents – in which I reiterate, the United States played no role – all parties refrain from any actions which could plunge the region into a devastating war.”

Tens of thousands of people have been evacuated from homes on both sides of the Israel-Lebanon border since Hezbollah began firing rockets into Israel in October in support of Gaza, where Israel is waging a devastating war that has killed more than 41,000 Palestinians.

Israel, which last fought an all-out war against Hezbollah 18 years ago, has said it will use force if necessary to ensure its citizens can return to their homes in northern Israel.

A top Hezbollah commander has been killed in an Israeli strike in the suburbs of Lebanon’s capital of Beirut on Friday, the Israeli military has confirmed.

Ibrahim Aqil, Hezbollah’s operations commander, was killed in a strike that killed three people and wounded 17 others, Lebanon’s health ministry said.

Israel’s Defence Forces (IDF) have confirmed they killed Aqil and other senior commanders of Hezbollah’s Radwan special forces unit.

“The IDF will continue to act to degrade Hezbollah’s capabilities, strike at it, and operate on all fronts to protect the citizens of Israel,” a statement reads.

What Israel had earlier today referred to as a “targeted” strike was also reported to have killed five children, according to the Lebanese National News Agency.

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Updates on airstrikes on Lebanon

Sky News’ special correspondent Alex Crawford said the attack appeared to have hit a residential apartment block.

Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati said Friday’s strike shows Israel “gives no weight to any humanitarian, legal or moral considerations”.

It comes as fighting between Iranian-backed Hezbollah and Israel has intensified in the past few days after 37 people were killed when pagers and radios across Lebanon blew up in two separate attacks.

That attack was widely believed to have been carried out by Israel, which has neither confirmed or denied its involvement.

Aqil has served as the head of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Force and Jihad Council, the group’s highest military body.

The US State Department has sanctioned him for his alleged role in carrying out the 1983 bombing of the US Embassy in Beirut, which killed 63 people.

It had been offering a reward of $7m (£5.3m) for information about Aqil.

The US said he was the “principal member” of the group that bombed the American embassy in 1983, and the US Marine barracks in the same year, killing 241 US personnel.

Aqil’s death marks the second time in less than two months Israel has targeted a top Hezbollah commander.

In July an Israeli airstrike killed Fuad Shukr, the militant group’s top military commander.

Israel’s rare strike on the capital’s southern suburbs came after Iranian-backed Hezbollah pounded Israel with 140 rockets, which the Israeli military said came in three waves targeting sites along the ravaged border with Lebanon.

Following the attacks, the Israeli military said that it had struck areas across southern Lebanon targeting Hezbollah infrastructure, but did not provide details of damage.

Hezbollah said that its attacks had targeted several sites along the border with Katyusha rockets, including multiple air defence bases as well as the headquarters of an Israeli armoured brigade they said they had struck for the first time.

The developments of the past few days have raised strong concerns of an all-out war in the region, with Israel also engaged in an 11-month war with Hamas, another militant group backed by Iran, in Gaza.

According to Gaza’s health ministry, more than 41,000 people have been killed since the war broke out following Hamas’ massacre of 1,200 people in southern Israel on 7 October.

The U.S. will host an artificial intelligence (AI) safety summit in November, aiming to further align top nations on their tech goals and priorities of collaboration among the international community. 

“AI is the defining technology of our generation,” U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo said in a press release. 

“With AI evolving at a rapid pace, we at the Department of Commerce, and across the Biden-Harris administration, are pulling every lever. That includes close, thoughtful coordination with our allies and like-minded partners,” she said. 

“We want the rules of the road on AI to be underpinned by safety, security and trust, which is why this convening is so important.”

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The U.S. AI Safety Summit will take place after November’s presidential election and is separate from the series of safety summits hosted by the U.K. and South Korea. Another summit is planned for France next year.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Raimondo will host the summit in San Francisco between Nov. 20-21, convening the International Network of AI Safety Institutes, which nations aimed to establish after the South Korea summit. 

The network so far includes Australia, Canada, the European Union, Japan, Kenya, South Korea, Singapore, the United Kingdom and the United States, according to Reuters. 

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Britain’s Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology Michelle Donelan, second from left, listens as Lee Jong-ho, second from right, South Korea’s Minister of Science and ICT, speaks during the Ministers’ Session of the AI Seoul Summit at the Korea Institute of Science and Technology in Seoul May 22, 2024. (Anthony Wallace/AFP via Getty Images)

Chief among their concerns remains the use of generative AI to create forgeries in a variety of materials, including election-related items such as ads and pictures. A recent example included Taylor Swift AI-generated images that prompted her to speak out and declare her pick for president. 

Deepfake videos have also proven a prevalent and complicating factor in elections, such as when a Turkish presidential candidate last year claimed a leaked sex tape was actually an AI-edited video with his face placed over an actor’s face in a pornographic video. 

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President Biden, right, and Chinese President Xi Jinping walk together after a meeting during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Leaders’ week in Woodside, Calif., Nov. 15, 2023. (Brendan Smialowski/AFP via Getty Images)

Blinken touted the AI network as a step toward greater safety and security, as well as the potential to harness AI to achieve greater goals. 

“Strengthening international collaboration on AI safety is critical to harnessing AI technology to solve the world’s greatest challenges,” Blinken said in a press release. “The AI Safety Network stands as a cornerstone of this effort.”

The summit will also invite experts from related fields, including academia and the tech industry, to join certain events and weigh in with “robust” views and developments to help keep officials up to date on the rapidly evolving sector. 

The White House and Department of Commerce referred Fox News Digital to the joint department statement on the summit when asked for comment.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.