“Approvals have been granted to open schools following the Lebanese education system in Iraq, with the presence of Lebanese educational staff and administrators currently in the country,” Karim al-Sayyid, a spokesperson for Iraq’s Ministry of Education, told Rudaw.
Iraq’s migration and displacement ministry on Tuesday said 13,000 Lebanese refugees have arrived in the country since Israel ramped up its strikes against Hezbollah positions in Lebanon.
“The number of Lebanese guests is still increasing; hundreds of families have come, and [the number of] students is increasing,” said Sayyid, adding that "there is no exact figure yet on this matter.”
Iraq officially labels Lebanese citizens fleeing the conflict as “guests of Iraq.” Prime Minister Mohammed Shia’ al-Sudani earlier this month approved the allocation of 3 billion dinars (about $2.27 million) to the migration ministry to assist the Lebanese refugees.
On Wednesday, Ali Abbas, a spokesperson for the ministry, told Rudaw that the al-Qaim border crossing between Iraq’s Anbar province and Syria “witnesses the entry of about five to ten buses carrying Lebanese people daily.”
Around 8,000 of the Lebanese refugees who have arrived in Iraq are staying in Karbala, Abbas detailed. The refugees also have been settled in the provinces of Baghdad, Najaf, and Salahaddin, according to the migration ministry.
Iraq also has sent several rounds of aid to Lebanon; the Iraqi Red Crescent Society said earlier this month that 150 tons of food supplies and aid had been sent to the country since the conflict began.
After nearly a year of war in the Gaza Strip, Israel turned to its northern neighbor Lebanon to remove pro-Iran Hezbollah fighters from southern Lebanon and allow tens of thousands of displaced Israelis from the north to return safely to their homes.
Since the start of the conflict, Israeli bombardments have killed 2,653 people and injured 12,360 others in Lebanon, according to data compiled by the Lebanese health ministry last week. Nearly a quarter of the population, 1.2 million people, have been displaced, Lebanon's caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said earlier this month.
