Ahead of a key meeting of the United Nations Educational, Social Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) in Paris to list Lebanese cultural sites that need enhanced protection, over 300 cultural professionals, including archaeologists and academics, have called on the United Nations to safeguard war-torn Lebanon’s heritage.

The professionals made the appeal in a petition published on Sunday and addressed to Audrey Azoulay, Director General, UNESCO ahead of the meeting on the special meeting on Lebanon called by Azoulay. Over the past few months, several Israeli strikes on Baalbek in the east and Tyre in south Lebanon, hit close to ancient Roman ruins that have been designated as UNESCO World Heritage sites.

The petition urges UNESCO to protect Baalbek and other heritage sites by establishing ‘no-target zones’ around them, deploying international observers and enforcing measures from the 1954 Hague Convention on cultural heritage in conflict. According to UNESCO, the status of enhanced protection gives heritage sites high-level immunity from military attacks.

“Lebanon’s cultural heritage at large is being endangered by recurrent assaults on ancient cities such as Baalbek, Tyre and Anjar, all UNESCO World Heritage Sites, as well as on other historic landmarks,” says the petition.

The petition also calls on influential states to push for an end to military action that causes destruction of damage to sites, as well as adding protections or introducing sanctions.

Change Lebanon, the charity that initiated the petition, says that the signatories included museum curators, academics, archaeologists and writers in Britain, France, Italy and the United States.

“Criminal prosecutions and sanctions, conducted by the competent authorities, may apply in cases where individuals do not respect the enhanced protection granted to a cultural property,” it said. In Baalbek, Israeli strikes about 10 days ago hit near the city’s Roman temples, according to authorities, destroying a heritage house dating back to the French mandate and damaged the historic site.

The region’s governor reportedly said that a missile fell in the car park of a 1,000-year-old temple, the closest strike since the start of the war. The ruins host the Baalbek Festival each year, a landmark event founded in 1956 and now a fixture on the international cultural scene, featuring performances by music legends like Oum Kalthoum, Charles Aznavour and Ella Fitzgerald.