Five Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) safely returned to the country from Lebanon on 8 April, arriving on the Turkish Airlines flight TK084 at the Ninoy Aquino Internation Airport (NAIA) Terminal 3.

Assistant Secretary Maria Regina Angela Galias of the Department of Migrant Workers (DMW) welcomed the OFWs to ensure their well-being and offer assistance and services, as President Marcos Jr. directed a command to secure the safe return of Filipinos affected by the ongoing conflict in the Middle East.

On Wednesday, Israel’s military launched its most powerful attacks on Lebanon, killing hundreds of people, turning the good news of the ceasefire into an aggressive outbreak.

Attacks across parts of Beirut, Southern Lebanon and the Eastern Bekaa Valley shot towering columns of pungent smoke into the sky above the capital, forcing immediate evacuation.

Lebanon's civil defense service said the strikes had killed around 254 people and injured 1,165. The Health Ministry also set the preliminary death toll from the new strikes at 182, heaping more casualties on the more than 1,500 in Lebanon already killed in the five-week-old Israeli attack.

DMW also offers assistance such as free skills training, seed capital, psychological counseling, and job matching for the OFWs to help them recover and be reintegrated into employment.