Mohammad Baqer Mohammadi told IRNA on a phone call on Wednesday that Iran’s medical personnel have been treating patients for the last two weeks.

Iran’s field hospital locates near Dhahiya neighborhood in Beirut and people from other parts of Lebanon also come to receive medical services in that complex.

The first cargo of Iran’s humanitarian aid comprising 95 tons of food and medicine arrived in Beirut on August 6.

The massive explosion that defaced the coastline of Beirut, destroying hundreds of buildings, has reportedly killed 220 people and wounded more than 6,000 others.

The disastrous blast was caused by detonation of more than 2,000 tons of ammonium nitrate stored at a warehouse in the Lebanese capital.

Iran is the first country that rushed to help Lebanon by sending medical and humanitarian aid immediately after the disaster.

So for many Lebanese, their greatest hope for credible answers about the blast that wrecked much of their capital may lie with outsiders: The French forensic police who have joined the probe and FBI investigators are expected to take part, The Associated Press reported.

French teams have pressed ahead at their work, sending divers into the underwater crater, taking explosives samples and preparing recommendations for both French and Lebanese magistrates. Among the French judicial police on the case are men and women who responded after the 2004 tsunami in Japan, the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, and the November 2015 and Bastille Day 2016 terror attacks in France.

The Beirut explosion lies at the crossroads of a disastrous accident and a crime scene. It still was not known what sparked the fire that ignited nearly 3,000 tons of ammonium nitrate that were stored for years in Beirut’s port next to densely populated residential areas. Documents have emerged that show the country’s top leadership and security officials were aware of the stockpile.

Search and rescue crews flew in from around the world in the immediate aftermath and found themselves looking at a scene that was both familiar and yet strangely alien.

“In an earthquake, it’s easier because we can understand … how it moves. But in this case, we didn’t have enough elements to understand what happened,” said Alberto Boanini, a member of the Italian rescue team. The team has seen its share of quakes and forest fires, but nothing quite like the port in Beirut, where he said it was hard to fathom what could level it so completely.

Many Lebanese want the probe taken out of the hands of their own government, having learned from past experience that the long-entrenched political factions, notorious for corruption, won’t allow any results damaging to their leadership to come to light. The explosion killed more than 175 people, injured at least 6,000, and left tens of thousands homeless.

Paris sent judicial police because a French architect was among the dead, and French law gives jurisdiction for an investigation if a citizen dies abroad under questionable circumstances.

But the French investigators work only at the invitation of the Lebanese, and their orders are confidential.

French officials say they have the access they need but will not say whether their inquiry can extend to questioning witnesses or requesting documents. They hand over their findings to the Lebanese, but keep a mirror copy for a French inquiry. The FBI is also joining at Lebanese authorities’ invitation.

Top Lebanese officials, including President Michel Aoun, have rejected calls for an independent probe, describing it as “a waste of time” and suggesting it would be politicized.

In its last decision before resigning under pressure, six days after the explosion, Prime Minister Hassan Diab’s government referred the port explosion case to the Higher Judicial Council, Lebanon’s highest justice authority, to carry out the investigation.

An argument then ensued with the outgoing justice minister over the investigation’s lead judge. The outgoing minister proposed a figure whom the panel rejected as too close to Aoun’s party. After wrangling back and forth, they settled on a compromise, Judge Fadi Sawwan, a former military investigating judge.

The Council itself is made up of 10 people, eight of whom are appointed according to the interests of the various political factions and religious sects in line with Lebanon’s sectarian power-sharing system.

The authorities have so far arrested at least 19 people in connection to the blast, including the head of the Customs Department and his predecessor, as well as the head of the port.

Lebanese say they want to see top officials who knew about the existence of the ammonium nitrate being investigated.

“They will blame the small guys while the ones who are really responsible will get away with their crime, that’s what will happen,” said Jad, a 38-year-old computer engineer who declined to give his full name in line with his company’s regulations not to discuss politics.

“Look, it’s simple. If this time there is no credible, serious investigation that will lead to the punishment of everyone responsible for this disaster, it is goodbye Lebanon. No one will ever want to live in this country again,” he said, standing on a bridge overlooking the decimated port. He had come to inspect the damage.

Lebanese forensics expert Omar Nachabe said the public infighting about the name of the lead investigator is a bad sign that casts doubt on the credibility of any local investigation.

“If I am a Lebanese citizen, my capital (city) has been destroyed. I want a quick and serious investigation, yet the government has not shown until now that it is up to the task,” he told the local channel LBCI. He lamented the time wasted before the explosion was referred to the HJC and the bickering that continues till now.

Explosions have marked a grim timeline in Lebanon’s modern history and have killed presidents, prime ministers and countless journalists and activists during the country’s 1975-90 civil war and beyond.

Almost none of the perpetrators were ever arrested or tried, and the truth was invariably buried. Lebanese had high hopes that the UN-backed tribunal investigating the 2005 killing of Prime Minister Rafik Hariri would be a chance to end impunity in Lebanon. But it took 15 years and was marred by doubts, politics and more deaths. The tribunal is to issue verdicts Tuesday.

International involvement in the investigation might bring some truth, but bringing justice is more complicated. Dov Jacobs, an international legal scholar based in the Netherlands, said the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over eastern Ukraine six years ago might be the closest analogy.

In that case, international experts had full access to the site, and international prosecutors charged three Russians and a Ukrainian with involvement in bringing down the plane and the murder of all on board. The men are on trial in a Dutch court in absentia, since none have been extradited.

But in Lebanon, Jacobs said, “the investigation itself is a tool of political influence. It’s one of those frustrating moments where immediate calls for justice are faced with a wall which is the political reality on the ground.”

“After the enormous Beirut catastrophe, I announce my resignation from government,” she said in a statement carried by local media, AFP reported.

She said in her resignation letter that change remained “elusive” and she regrets failing to fulfill the aspirations of the Lebanese people.

Her resignation comes as about half a dozen lawmakers offered to step aside over government performance. Local media also reported that another minister, and a close advisor to Prime Minister Hassan Diab, was also expected to resign. Diab met with his cabinet reportedly to discuss the resignations Sunday, but there were no comments after the meeting, AP wrote.

Diab said Saturday he would propose early elections to break the impasse that is plunging Lebanon ever deeper into political and economic crisis.

The head of Lebanon’s Maronite church meanwhile called on the entire government to step down over the August 4 explosion.

Abdel-Samad’s resignation came after a night of demonstrations against the government.

While the exact circumstances that led to the blast in a Beirut port warehouse are not yet known, protesters said it could not have happened without the kind of corruption and incompetence that has come to define Lebanon’s ruling class.

Hundreds of tons of highly explosive material were stored in the waterfront hangar, and the blast sent a shock wave that killed at least 160 people, wounded nearly 6,000 and defaced the coastline of Beirut — destroying hundreds of buildings.

Protesters enraged by the blast vowed to continue to rally after a night of street clashes in which they stormed several ministries.

French President Emmanuel Macron on Sunday oversaw a UN-backed virtual donors conference in Paris to raise aid for Lebanon, a country already mired in a painful economic crisis.

The world must respond “quickly and effectively” to the disaster, Macron warned, urging international cooperation “to ensure that neither violence nor chaos prevails”.

The mood was one of grief and fury in Beirut, a day after many of the dead were laid to rest and when thousands demonstrated in the biggest anti-government rally the country has seen in months.

The army Saturday used tear gas and rubber bullets to clear hundreds of protesters from the central Martyrs’ Square.

The street violence left 65 people injured, according to the Red Cross.

Demonstrators temporarily occupied the Foreign Ministry building before being forced out by the army three hours later.

Protesters, some brandishing nooses, also stormed the economy and energy ministries and the Association of Banks before they were pushed back out by soldiers.

Rescuers meanwhile kept digging through the rubble of toppled buildings as hopes slowly faded of finding more survivors from the colossal blast that was felt as far away as Cyprus.