Three weeks ago, members of Hezbollah kidnapped two Israeli soldiers, triggering a major air and ground assault on Lebanon by Israeli forces.

Israel has this week rejected calls for a truce as its forces sweep even further into Lebanon.

The international community, meanwhile, continues to disagree over the urgency of a ceasefire.

Christian Today spoke to Canon Andrew White, Anglican Vicar of Baghdad and head of the Foundation for Reconciliation in the Middle East, on the growing crisis in the Middle East.

CT: The situation in Lebanon is nothing short of a mess. With both sides breaking truce agreements and Israel now making moves to expand its ground offensive, how do you even begin to talk about reconciliation in this kind of climate?

AW: Well, the fact is you have to continue working for peace; you can’t necessarily talk about reconciliation. And a lot of endeavours that we were working at we’ve had to temporarily put on hold because there is no way you can continue as if nothing has happened when the whole face of the region has changed. So what you’ve go to do is you’ve got to continue working towards the process of peacemaking and meet the needs of the people.

A lot of our work right now is humanitarian work, actual working at trying to get people food and medicine and the amount of work we can do at reconciliation is greatly diminished.

CT: So your focus has had to shift?