Kuwait to give Lebanon 800 million dollar aid package

The government "decided to deposit 500 million dollars with Lebanon's central bank, in addition to Kuwait's grant of 300 million dollars to (help) rebuild what was destroyed by the Israeli aggression," said a cabinet statement carried by the state KUNA news agency after the government's weekly meeting.

The grant of 300 million dollars had been announced earlier by KUNA, which said it was allocated in a draft law that has to be approved by parliament.

The cabinet said oil-rich Kuwait would also grant two million dollars to a number of UN humanitarian bodies distributing relief aid in Lebanon to help the country cope with "the tragic situation" it is experiencing.

KUNA said the new aid was in addition to an earlier grant of 20 million dollars in urgent relief aid to Lebanon and the Palestinians, who have also been targeted by a massive Israeli offensive against the Gaza Strip.

The Kuwaiti contribution is the second largest after that of oil powerhouse Saudi Arabia, which has pledged a 1.5-billion-dollar package to help Lebanon cope with the devastating Israeli onslaught.

The Saudi package consists of a one-billion-dollar deposit with Lebanon's central bank and a grant of 500 million dollars.

Riyadh had also offered 50 million dollars in emergency aid.

Over 750 Lebanese, mostly civilians, have been killed in the Israeli assault, sparked by the July 12 capture of two Israeli soldiers by the Shiite Hezbollah movement with the aim of forcing a prisoner swap.

The announcement of the Kuwaiti package coincided with a particularly deadly day in Lebanon, which saw more than 50 civilians, most of them children, killed in an Israeli air strike on the southern Lebanese village of Qana.

The Kuwaiti government "strongly denounced the appalling massacres, the targeting of basic infrastructure, and the organized state terrorism continuously practiced by Israel against the brotherly Lebanese people, the latest being the Qana massacre which victimized innocent children, women and elderly men," the cabinet statement said.

It also denounced "the silence of the international community on these massacres and crimes."

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